You’re reading Significant Digits, a daily digest of the telling numbers tucked inside the news.
19 chemicals
The Food and Drug Administration is banning all antimicrobial soaps containing any of 19 specified chemicals. The FDA’s ruling comes on the heels of research suggesting that the soaps don’t pose a major benefit to users and could help develop bacteria with resistance to antibiotics. [Ars Technica]
19 percent
Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, hails from the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. And yet the Christian Democrats, Merkel’s party, saw a major defeat on her home turf, finishing third, with 19 percent of the vote, in state elections in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern on Sunday. The results would seem to be a rebuke of Merkel’s refugee policy: Her center-right party was outflanked on the right by Alternative for Germany, an anti-migrant party that took second place and 21 percent of the vote. [The New York Times]
78.6 percent
On average, teachers in the U.S. make 78.6 percent of what other workers with the same level of education make. [Bloomberg]
$147
How much money should you spend on a gift when someone in your immediate family is getting married? Respondents to a SurveyMonkey poll spent, on average, $147. That drops to an average of $82 on a wedding gift for a close friend and $71 for a member of their extended family. [FiveThirtyEight]
$17.6 million
Money paid to Bill Clinton over five years, from 2010 to 2015, by Laureate International Universities, a network of for-profit colleges. Clinton worked as a consultant and “honorary chancellor” for the company. [Washington Post]
$2.3 billion
Projected value of the ready-to-drink coffee beverage market by 2020, according to Research and Markets, up from $2 billion today. Soft drink conglomerates like Coca-Cola are taking notice: The company’s Gold Peak brand is moving into coffee. [Business Insider]
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