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Tim Harford explains the numbers and statistics in the news and in life.

Radio 4,684 episodes

Episodes

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Is Trump right about violent crime in Venezuela and the US?
Donald Trump says Venezuela is becoming safer than the US. Is he right?
26 Oct 2024,10 mins
Do US crime statistics miss out the most violent cities?
Plus: MP capital gains claims and grizzly bear berry habits
23 Oct 2024,28 mins
Nobel prize: Why are some countries so much richer than others?
Why Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics
19 Oct 2024,8 mins
When are numbers like a horse at a gymkhana?
Plus: the taxes of 60 very rich people, water bill spreadsheets, and is 0 a small number?
16 Oct 2024,28 mins
Uncertainty, probability and double yoked eggs
Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter on his new book, The Art of Uncertainty
12 Oct 2024,8 mins
Should the government target persnuffle?
Plus, childhood obesity, birds hitting windows and Sir David Spiegelhalter’s origin story.
09 Oct 2024,27 mins
Are 672 billion pounds of corn eaten in the US every year?
A lot of corn is eaten in the United States, but is it really 2.5kg per person per day?
05 Oct 2024,10 mins
How do you breed seventeen octillion rats?
Plus, GPs working less, the UK working less, and Wetherspoons wanting to pay less tax.
02 Oct 2024,28 mins
The puzzles you’re meant to get wrong
Alex Bellos sets Tim Harford logical conundrums designed to deceive
28 Sep 2024,8 mins
Could the winter fuel cut cost more than it saves?
Plus, ONS transgender stats, early-onset cancer, and puzzles you’re meant to get wrong
25 Sep 2024,28 mins
Do 85% of the world’s population practice a religion?
Counting religions across the globe – is the world getting more religious or less?
21 Sep 2024,10 mins
How do you count millionaires?
Plus, asylum seeker costs, private school bets and Baumol's cost disease
18 Sep 2024,28 mins
Nate Silver: Do risk-takers run the world?
Poker player and polling analyst Nate Silver on his new book
14 Sep 2024,8 mins
How long does it take to turn around an oil tanker?
Plus, Migrants vs Pensioners and Ed Miliband’s energy auction claim
11 Sep 2024,27 mins
Who pays when trade wars heat up?
We look at Donald Trump’s claim that tariffs are a tax on other countries
07 Sep 2024,8 mins
Exclusions, black holes and dividing by zero
Plus special educational needs in Wales and Ghanian nurses in the UK
04 Sep 2024,28 mins
Where have Cuba’s people gone?
We investigate the collapse in the Caribbean island’s population
31 Aug 2024,9 mins
Do we eat a credit card's worth of microplastic each week?
We look at whether humans really ingest five grams of microplastic on a weekly basis
24 Aug 2024,8 mins
Are companies making more money from their customers?
We investigate claims mark-ups are larger than ever
17 Aug 2024,8 mins
Is planet Earth getting greener?
Jordan Peterson says Earth has greened by 20% in 20 years. Is he right?
10 Aug 2024,10 mins
Does a language die every two weeks?
Languages are disappearing. We investigate claims of how often this happens.
03 Aug 2024,9 mins
Are women 14 times more likely to die in natural disasters?
We unpick the idea that women outnumber men by 14 to 1 as casualties of natural disasters
27 Jul 2024,12 mins
Is increasing turbulence making flying more dangerous?
Exploring the link between bumpy flights and climate change
20 Jul 2024,10 mins
Federer’s 54%: Tennis stats explained
How Federer became the best in the world winning just over half the points he played
13 Jul 2024,8 mins
The magic of trigonometry
Tim Harford interviews Matt Parker on his latest book ‘Love Triangle’
06 Jul 2024,9 mins
Election endings, tennis and meeting men in finance
Exit polls, election claims, and a 54% chance of winning a point in tennis
03 Jul 2024,37 mins
How a tick box doubled the US maternal mortality rates.
We investigate changes to the way the US gathers their maternal mortality statistics
29 Jun 2024,9 mins
Election claims and erection claims
What did Liz Truss do to mortgage rates? Do erections use a litre of blood?
26 Jun 2024,28 mins
Do ‘pig butchering’ cyber scams make as much as half Cambodia’s GDP?
We investigate the money made by an international cybercrime operation
22 Jun 2024,9 mins
Worse mortgages, better readers, and potholes on the moon
We check some of the numbers that are flying about in the election campaign
19 Jun 2024,31 mins