Events | 2010.01.17
The comfort of statistics | Joe Moran
Spurious or not, it is reassuring to be told how much everything from snow to swine flu costs
If there is one thing I would like to see more of in 2010, it is those statistics that purport to tell us how much such-and-such a thing is costing the British economy. While this week\'s snow has come in at £2bn, last year offered pretty slim pickings. We had to make do with the following stories about how much actual or possible events were costing or might cost the economy: EU regulations ( £184bn by 2020 ), hangovers (£54.7m a year), ID fraud ( £1.7bn a year ), headaches ( £1.5bn a year ), illegal downloads ( £120bn a year ), swine flu ( £1.5bn a day ), staff pulling sickies in the summer heatwave ( £190m a day ), the loss of the British grand prix ( $1bn ), people using social networking sites at work ( £1.38bn a year ) and Andy Murray losing at Wimbledon (£150m). Admittedly, this is a far from exhaustive list, but I still think we will need to do much better this year.
Naturally, a few statistical pedants claim these figures are not always accurate. They argue such statistics are essentially a spurious extrapolation of the cost-benefit analysis, in which you try to measure externalities – unseen costs accrued by society as a whole, like time-savings or accident rates – as well as direct costs. For all their anomalies, you can see how cost-benefit analyses might be necessary if you are going to commit public money to expensive infrastructure. But, the pedants say, things become more problematic when you are trying to compute, something like all the billions lost from people staying off work, the "productivity hole". For this assumes that when people are at work they are all dutifully contributing to our GDP every minute of the day – rather than attending meetings to decide the date of the next meeting.
In any case, these pedants point out, the economy is not a self-contained totality: money that isn\'t spent on one thing can get spent on another. Even employees who are off sick might be earning money for Beechams and the companies who advertise consolidated loans during Countdown.
These pedants are right, of course. But they are missing the point. The purpose of these figures is not to convey information. It is to offer reassurance. These statistics are always cited by their originators with enormous authority, as if only an ignoramus could possibly disagree. Given we have heard so much recently about funny money – toxic debts, sub-prime mortgages, money that turned out not to exist – then this sort of confidence is immensely comforting. Thank God, we think, that someone is keeping count and knows how much everything costs, especially now there is no money left. In the current climate of austerity, the work of the costings industry offers a consoling mood music.
Statistics, as the social scientist Joel Best writes, are "numeric statements about social life". We think of them as simply facts, but actually they are numbers we create to make sense of the world. For instance, if you think something is really annoying, like people using Twitter or going on strike, finding out that this is costing the economy lots of money can give you a pleasing sense of righteous indignation. The actual figures don\'t really matter. Most of us, as Best points out, are no good at distinguishing between large numbers – £20m or £20bn, it\'s all Greek to us.
Most important, these statistics give a sense of the ebb and flow of the year. In January, we have figures about the money being wasted by staff who are still hung over after new year, or who can\'t get to work because of the snow. Then, in June, we will be told how much all those malingerers who are calling in sick to go to the beach or watch Wimbledon are costing us. Such statistics remind us of the eternal cycle of the seasons, the kind of work that used to be done by winter solstices and harvest festivals. That is why it is vital we keep producing these figures. Without them, we would not know what day it is.
For more information, please visit
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/[...]n/08/the-comfort-of-statistics
