It’s in our nature to compare things. What’s better? What’s worse? What falls in the middle? However, make sure you don’t end up in an apples and oranges situation where the comparisons don’t even make sense or are completely useless.
Incorrect conclusion
The cost of everything is going up!
Ground beef costs twice as much as it did in 1980. How am I going to make my mom’s famous omelettes when eggs prices are going through the roof? The world is crumbling to pieces. I want to cry.Actual
Okay, but these average prices don’t account for inflation. You can’t compare monetary values over time without thinking about the changing value of a dollar. One dollar in 1980 is the value of about three dollars in 2017. So the ground beef price of $1.82 in 1980 dollars is $5.73 in 2017 dollars, meaning the price decreased.
Incorrect conclusion
White people must be really fertile and have a lot of kids! Look how many more white women had a child than all the other groups. It’s not even close.
Actual
Okay, but the chart shows absolute counts. There are many more white people than the others, so there are inevitably more women who gave birth in total. But, if you look at rates — say, number of women who gave birth per 1,000…
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