The last Olympics event
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The last Olympics event
- August 12, 2012
- Don Saari, economics Distinguished Professor and Institute for Mathematical Behavioral Sciences director, is quoted in The Wall Street Journal August 12, 2012
From The Wall Street Journal:
My print column examines the Olympics medal table, and how countries should be ranked
by their athletes' performance. The most common question is, what should count for
more, gold medals or overall medals? Most of the world - including the Olympics' official
website, BBC, Xinhua, the Moscow Times and even an electronic screen on the side of
a trash bin in central London on Sunday - rank countries by golds. In the U.S., including
the websites of The Wall Street Journal and Olympics broadcaster NBC, overall medals
are the basis for country ranking. Then there are other options, such as calculating
medals per million people. "It is easy to create a method to favor a particular country,
said Donald G. Saari, director of the Institute for Mathematical Behavioral Sciences
at the University of California, Irvine. Saari added, jokingly, "Stated in another
manner, 'For a price, I will design a counting rule that will make your country look
much, much better with the medal count!' "
For the full story, please visit http://blogs.wsj.com/numbersguy/the-last-olympics-event-1158/.
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