Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2011 June 11

= June 11 =

Politicians in a different kind of race
According to a recent article about my state's Lt. Governor Phil Scott, he may be the only governor or acting governor who has participated in a professional car race while in office. Would he be the first? Dismas |(talk) 02:30, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Not exactly the same, but North Carolina governor Mike Easley was involved in a wreck in a NASCAR car while in office. He was taking some practice laps at Lowe's Motor Speedway in Jimmie Johnson's #48 car and put it in the wall.  It wasn't during an actual race, but it is about as close as you are going to get.  See .  -- Jayron  32  03:18, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * For "politicians competing in races" more generally, there is always Edward Heath, who was part of the team which won the Admiral's Cup in 1971 whilst Prime Minister. (It's a good thing nothing else required his attention, I guess) Shimgray | talk | 09:31, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * The 24 Heures du Mans starts in less than an hour so it may be as well to mention Paul Drayson, who resigned from Ministerial office so he could compete in the American Le Mans series, and then competed in the 24 hour race in 2009 while serving in office. Sam Blacketer (talk) 12:11, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * He never competed while he was the sovereign prince, but the current Prince of Monaco, Albert II, Prince of Monaco competed in several olympics as a bobsledder, in 1988, 1992, 1994, 1998, and 2002.  He inherited the Monagasque throne in 2005.  -- Jayron  32  03:32, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Deaths of children on the road
Would anyone have statistics for the number of children who have died on the roads over the years and in different countries? I am not thinking of children as passengers in cars (or other motorised vehicles) but when they are walking, riding their bicycles, or simply playing on the streets. The streets used to belong to children: street games from large (football) to small (marbles). My impression is that the number of deaths peaked in industrialised countries surprisingly early (1920s) and that the number declined as children's play was pulled inside. But I don't have a source for that. BrainyBabe (talk) 08:46, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I suspect that first the creation of parks allowed parents to have kids go there, where at least they wouldn't get run over. Kids staying inside all day likely didn't happen until A/C, TV, video games, and, more recently, computers and the Internet. StuRat (talk) 09:12, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Eh? I know plenty of kids stay inside most of the time without A/C in Malaysia. Nil Einne (talk) 13:28, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Found this table for Norway from 1970 to today. Google mis-translates the last column, should be "sledding etc". That one should cover children being run over when sledding in the winter, and it shows a large decline, as does pedestrian accidents (though it is not broken down by age). Pedestrian deaths are down from 182 in 1970 to 22 in 2010. Note that population and car ridership increased by a lot over the same period. In Norway the pedestrian accident numbers went up by a lot as automobilism increased in the 1950s and 1960s, and then went gradually down as society became aware of the problem. But in Norway this is not perceived to go with a general tendency to keep kids inside --- rather it was a large effort to teach kids about traffic safety, to move play from streets to yards, parks, forests and gardens. Cable TV and video games did not emerge until the 1980s in this part of the world. So I'm not sure I believe in the thesis of the original poster. Jørgen (talk) 14:27, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Road hockey and other on-street activities are still common where I live. ~ AH1 (discuss!) 17:16, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I believe in the UK road deaths declined from the peak in the 20s or 30s due to the introduction of things like driving tests and speed limits, not because children were kept indoors. Not directly related, but in recent years children often tend to have their leisure time completely controled by their parents, as they are driven from activity to activity and never left to freely roam the streets with their friends as I was. 92.24.181.38 (talk) 23:47, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * This British report concluded; "Child mortality from accidental injury declined by 34% between 1985 and 1992, while children walked and cycled less distance and travelled substantially more by car in 1992 compared with 1985". A 1990 study by Mayer Hillman, "One False Move" says; "In 1971, 80 per cent of seven and eight year old children (in the UK) were allowed to go to school without adult supervision. By 1990, this figure fell to 9 per cent. Road accidents involving children have declined not because the roads have become safer but because children can no longer be exposed to the dangers they pose." Alansplodge (talk) 17:05, 12 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Interesting. It would be fascinating to see a proper international,cross-C20 study, but in the meantime, thanks especially to Alansplodge and Jørgen. BrainyBabe (talk) 08:31, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

i need some data
Hi Administrators I have a research project about the Comparison of developments of countries. purpose of this project is to find a way to compare the performance of the country and it wants to collect comments Due 2000 people. i need to have some information from several countries. Good information from your site gained me much helped in this way, but other information I needed is groth of these countries. In other words, I ask you to give me previous information about these countries which is available in your archive. your sincerely Hamid Reza Hamidi Esfahani — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hamidhamidi (talk • contribs) 19:59, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * International rankings of Australia
 * International rankings of Brazil
 * International rankings of the People's Republic of China
 * International rankings of Egypt
 * International rankings of Germany
 * International rankings of India
 * International rankings of Indonesia
 * International rankings of Iran
 * International rankings of Lebanon
 * International rankings of the Netherlands
 * International rankings of Russia
 * International rankings of Sweden
 * International rankings of Switzerland
 * International rankings of Syria
 * International rankings of Turkey
 * International rankings of Venezuela


 * We here are not administrators but fellow Wikipedia readers (and editors). I'm not sure what you are asking - you seem to have found data for some countries. Other countries may (or may not) have smilar information. If wikipedia has the information it is readily avalable for you to read. You know what you want - look and see if it is there. -- SGBailey (talk) 20:44, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * You may click on the View history tab at the top of any of the article pages to access previous versions of the page, to find whether they contain earlier data. The archive does not go back very far in time. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 21:38, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I think you're looking for information about these countries going further back in time. You need to look up the various sources that are linked in the articles, for example the World Bank and the OECD. That is where the Wikipedia information came from. Itsmejudith (talk) 08:09, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Whole Grains
Why are whole grains usually more expensive than white bread? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.146.124.35 (talk) 23:53, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * It's probably a matter of scale. Bread is a mass-produced commodity item, while whole grains are consumed by far fewer people. If you buy in bulk, I suspect grain is cheaper. As of today, wheat is US$344 per ton. I don't exactly know the price of the cheapest bread (I paid EUR 1.90 for 400g of artisan dark bread today, and EUR1.15 for a 200g baguette, either of which comes to around US$ 6/kg before taxes - but then I don't buy bread in bulk). I suspect it's somewhere around a dollar per kilogram, i.e. 3 times more than wheat. Bread also contains some water, which is cheap, and, if you go by volume, a lot of gas (which is more-or-less free). I also seem to recall that white flour has a better shelf life than whole grains, because it does not contain fatty acids that go rancid. This would also affect spoilage and ease of storage. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:17, 12 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Yes, I think the shelf life is the key. Having more spoilage (or having to use expedited and/or refrigerated shipping to prevent spoilage) increases cost, and those costs must be passed on to the consumer. StuRat (talk) 00:22, 12 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Another impact on price is often "What the market will bear". Whole grain bread tends to be bought by a wealthier demographic, hence the higher price. HiLo48 (talk) 00:34, 12 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I think the cause and effect are confused there. That is, because the price is higher, wealthier people are more likely to buy them than the poor.  A couple centuries ago, the prices were reversed, as refining grains was expensive then.  Thus, wealthy people ate white bread, and poor people ate whole wheat. StuRat (talk) 00:45, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I have the impression that we understand the question differently. As I understand it, the OP asks why (white) bread is cheaper than (whole) grain, not why white bread is cheaper than whole grain bread. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:03, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, I see what you mean. The question is worded a little oddly. Its precise wording could perhaps be rephrased to "Why is a kilogram of wheat more expensive than a kilogram of white bread?" I don't know. HiLo48 (talk) 07:47, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * No one seems to have given any evidence that it is more expensive, and I seriously doubt that it is. Though I wouldn't be surprised if it were more expensive if you tried to buy it retail, because that's a low-volume specialty item if it exists at all (can't say I ever recall seeing it in a grocery store, and I've shopped in some hippie stores in my time).  --Trovatore (talk) 07:55, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Actually, living on the edge of a rural area in Australia, I can buy wheat from a stock feed store nearby. Haven't done so for some time, but I recall the price being much cheaper than bread of a similar weight. HiLo48 (talk) 11:06, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Analysing the OP's question again, they only said whole grains not whole grain wheat. I'm guessing in many places you can get brown rice (which is normally considered a form of whole grain). In NZ anyway, even in retail this can be slightly cheaper (although I wouldn't say much cheaper) than bread since IIRC I can get 1kg of budget brown rice for about the same price as 600g of budget white bread (or budget whole grain bread or wholemeal bread which are the same price). If you buy in greater bulk (still retail quantities) you may be able to get cheaper brown rice (although it's not as cheap as white rice) and marginally cheaper white bread (but you can usually store the rice for a while at room temperature, not so much with the bread). Off the top of my head things may be similar in Malaysia or at least the rice is about equal to the bread. You could also try whole grain maize or oat or barley or something although I'm not sure if these will win.
 * In the rice case, even though it may win, we seen an obvious snag somewhat similar to discussed above for flour. Despite increasing popularity, brown rice still isn't anywhere near as popular as white rice particularly among those who consume rice the most. (I think it also tends to have higher spoilage rates.) Therefore brown rice remains a speciality item produced in far lower quantities hence I can easily get 25 kg of white rice from a large variety of brands for low prices but not brown.
 * Also comparing in this way seems a little unfair, amongst other things these mostly aren't cooked products and tend to contain a lower percentage of water. When you cook, you often hydrate the product somewhat. Perhaps a comparison based on equivalent energy content or something will be fairer.
 * Nil Einne (talk) 22:38, 12 June 2011 (UTC)