Washington Monthly's Annual College Rankings

Update, September 30: Here's a link to Joe Nocera's column published yesterday about the pernicious effects of the college ranking system.

There's a lot to be said about the pernicious impact of college ranking systems in the US; you can read the most cogent criticism here. For a shorter version, read James Fallows' blog post today about the Washington Monthly's annual rankings, released today. You can see the Washington Monthly's rankings here. Read the editors' explanation of their system. Here's a brief excerpt:

The Washington Monthly rankings are based on three factors. The first is social mobility, which gives colleges credit for enrolling many low-income students and helping them earn degrees. The second recognizes research production, particularly at schools whose undergraduates go on to earn PhDs. Third, we value a commitment to service. The more expensive college becomes, the more students are encouraged to see higher education as a mere return on investment. The students in our best colleges are taught by example and design to look beyond themselves and give back.

Mapping the spread of languages

If you haven't already read it, take a look at this article in the New York Times describing a study applying statistical tools used for developing family trees to the spread of Indo-European languages. (And even if you've already read it, take a look at the graphic online - the screenshot is only part of it - it's much larger and clearer than the one in the printed paper.) And - this is a nice example of what Steven Johnson meant by the term "exaptation" - taking technology or a resource and using it in another - in his excellent book "Where Good Ideas Come From." More about that book here.

Charitable giving in the US - an interactive map

The Chronicle of Philanthropy has posted a study of charitable giving in the United States, along with an interactive map that lets you view, at the level of zip code, total contributions, as well as contributions, discretionary income, and percentage of income given by household. For each zip code, you can also look at different income levels. Here's a screenshot illustrating percent of income given per household from a zip code in the middle of the country:

 And another, showing median contribution per household, from New York City:

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The study is based on 2008 tax returns of Americans who itemized deductions and earned more than $50,000. (To calculate discretionary income, The Chronicle subtracted taxes paid, median housing costs for each zip code, and average living expenses from adjusted gross income.) Among the findings of the study:

  * Overall, Americans donated a median of 4.7% of discretionary income to charities. These donations accounted for about $135 billion of the $214 billion donated each year. (The rest appears to come from individuals who did not itemize donations.)

   * Households earning $50,000 to $75,000 gave an average of 7.6% of discretionary income to charity, compared to 4.2% of people earning $100,000 or more. Moreover, the report says:

Rich people who live in neighborhoods with many other wealthy people give a smaller share of their incomes to charity than rich people who live in more economically diverse communities. When people making more than $200,000 a year account for more than 40 percent of the taxpayers in a ZIP code, the wealthy residents give an average of 2.8 percent of discretionary income to charity, compared with an average of 4.2 percent for all itemizers earning $200,000 or more.

This seems like a crucial finding to me - it's a little worrisome that the highest income people might not be motivated to give, especially when governments are decreasing budgets and social services programs are cutting back. (But when I dug a little more deeply in The Chronicle's list of the 20th wealthiest zip codes I was not entirely convinced. Several of the zip codes listed are office buildings with their own zip codes - 10111 and 10112 are part of Rockefeller Center in New York City, for example.)

     * Tax incentives, views of the role of government, and religion matters. Utah, with many Mormon residents, who often tithe, led the list of states in terms of giving. But when religious giving is excluded, northeastern states jump to the top of the list. The report goes on:

When religious giving isn’t counted, the geography of giving is very different. Some states in the Northeast jump into the top 10 when secular gifts alone are counted. New York would vault from No. 18 to No. 2, and Pennsylvania would climb from No. 40 to No. 4.

The reasons for the discrepancies among states, cities, neighborhoods are rooted in part in each area’s political philosophy about the role of government versus charity.

 Overall, though, it's a very interesting data set, and very easy to use. Use the comments to let me know whether you agree.

Rape and pregnancy

Update, August 24: The New York Times has run a good story on the complexities of the term "rape." you can read it here.

OK, there's been a lot written about the politics. Not so much is appearing about the statistics, though there is one study, from 1996, in which the authors attempted to determine the rape-related pregnancy rate nationwide. You can't tell a lot about the methodology from the abstract, but the conclusion is stark: among adult women in the US, more than 32,000 pregnancies result from rape each year. The study also concluded that the rape-related pregnancy rate was 5%.

This is probably both an overestimate and an underestimate. According to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports, in 1996 there were 96,252 forcible rapes, so the study used a much broader definition of rape than the FBI does. (The FBI defines forcible rape as "the carnal knowledge of a female forcibly and against her will. Attempts or assaults to commit rape by force or threat of force are also included; however, statutory rape (without force) and other sex offenses are excluded.") In 2010, the FBI reports 84,767 forcible rapes. It would be interesting to know whether the other sex offenses rates are also decreasing. Regardless, whether or not force is used, rape can result in pregnancy.

James Hamblin of the Atlantic has more data you can use for triangulating here; I found the study through his blog post.

Nate Silver on Romney's VP pick

As you know, in election years I like to check in on Nate Silver's blog FiveThirtyEight, (eg here, here, and here) which is consistent, clear, interesting and well written. He's doing a particularly interesting job relating the impact of Romney's pick of Paul Ryan as a running mate. There have been a lot of theories for the pick floating around: Ryan is a Washington insider, he'll bring out the base, he understands the budget issues. (And don't forget to read Samuel Popkin's take on James Fallows' blog, here.)

I'm a numbers person, so I would have gone for someone who I thought might help me in a swing state, like Florida or Ohio. That means someone from a swing state who is popular in the state. Here's Silver's analysis of the likely VP choices as of August 8:

According to Silver, Florida, Ohio and Virginia are in play (as of now); Wisconsin and New Mexico are leaning Democratic. Silver says:

 Five candidates stood out as having especially strong positive ratings with their home-state voters. These were Mr. McDonnell of Virginia, along with Govs. Susana Martinez of New Mexico, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and Brian Sandoval of Nevada, and Senator John Thune of South Dakota. The ratings for Mr. Christie and Mr. Rubio were also fairly strong.

Another of Mr. Romney’s potential choices, Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, drew more mixed reactions. Although Mr. Ryan should win his home district, pollsters who tested his numbers throughout Wisconsin found more tenuous results, with 38 percent of voters giving him a positive rating and 33 percent a negative one.

Silver's model predicts (remember, this is as of August 8) that the pick of Ryan would increase Romney's chances of winning the Electoral College by 0.1%. That's not much.

You can read Silver's analysis of the bounce Ryan gave the ticket last week here. His bottom line? The bounce was "below-average." But, as Silver points out, the bounce now is not what's important. "If Mr. Romney makes a one-point advancement in the polls and holds it permanently from his selection of Mr. Ryan, then this would count as a successful vice presidential selection: a one-point shift in the polls is actually fairly meaningful given how close this race is."

And today, after giving it some thought, Silver argues that the selection, and the outcome, will give us some insight into the country's longer term political shifts. Read the post - the bottom line in particular is pretty interesting in the context of the full discussion.

More on Strategy, from McKinsey

Being alert to opportunity, perceiving and responding to threats, and making timely decisions: these three strategy components make up part of any executive's job, argue researchers in the McKinsey Quarterly, available here (free once you have registered). How do you do this? McKinsey offers some tips. (As usual with McKinsey, the context is for-profit business. As usual, the tips apply equally well to not-for-profit management jobs.)

First, the researchers say, understand what strategy means within the context of your sector. And, they add, don't save the work for the time of a strategic planning process.

Because strategy is a journey, executives need to study, understand, and internalize the economics, psychology, and laws of their industries, so that context can guide them continually.

In practice, this means thinking about your sector or agency as part of a larger system. If you provide mental health services, how do you related to hospitals? Referring sites? Single points of contact or assessment centers? Thinking of your services as part of a matrix of services lets you think more broadly about your strategy.

Second, learn to identify potential disruptive changes when they are far away. Expand the strategic group to gain a broader perspective. But there are other options as well. The authors offer the example of technology executives who check in on what technologies their younger colleagues, or even their children, are using. In the public sector, another way to think of potential disrupters is to look at large reimbursement areas. Large reimbursement areas for not-for-profits are large cost areas, which might be the source of large savings, for government agencies. For years, people in the foster care industry knew that Medicaid - to pay for medical services for children in foster care - was a large-budget item, and for years, governments have proposed different ways to reduce it. Most recently, there have been proposals to eliminate it entirely. For all those years, the Medicaid payment for children in foster care was a potential disruptive change.

Third, improve communications, or, as the researchers put it, "make strategic insights cut through the day-to-day morass of information." They suggest using experiential exercises, and making backup data easily available. "Executives hoping to become more strategic should look for opportunities to innovate in their communication of data, while prodding their organizations to institutionalize such capabilities." They also cite several examples of interactive data visualization efforts such as those of the New York Times, like this one showing restaurant cleanliness, and Hans Rosling's 200 years of changing life expectancies video, available here.

Anything can be counted!

I've heard it: your job is special, your work is unusual, you deal with subjective impressions of human beings, and human beings are all different. If there is an reason out there for why someone's work will not improve by being counted and tallied, it's been offered to me.

And generally rejected. I do think almost anything can be counted (though I will admit that some counts are better than others!). And here's an example: The  Daily Meal blog has analyzed the first six months of reviews of the New York Times restaurant critic Pete Wells, comparing his reviews with those of his two immediate predecessors. The screenshot above analyzes one factor, the number of stars each critic awarded. There are also charts demonstrating reviews by borough and reviews by location. OK, I admit, the charts are a little busy, what with each reviewer's picture repeated. But there's nothing wrong with the analysis. Here's a taste:

The three critics reviewed the same number of restaurants, but Wells’ 50 stars in six months makes him the most generous out of the gate. That’s three more stars than Bruni, and 14 more than Sifton. That generosity was also mirrored in how the new critic distributed stars. Wells bestowed two goose-eggs, seven one-spots, 15 two-fers, three three-star reviews, and reaffirmed one restaurant, Le Bernardin’s, four-star status. The three three-star reviews were on par with Bruni (4) and Sifton (3). But Sifton was more than twice as likely as Wells and five times as likely as Bruni to drop a big fat zero. Both Sifton and Bruni were almost twice as likely as Wells to give a restaurant one star. . . Most notably, Wells has been the czar of the two-star review.