INDICATORS

CENSUS BUREAU - Adults and teens will spend nearly five months next year
watching television, surfing the Internet, reading daily newspapers and
listening to personal music devices according to the Census Bureau's
Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2007.

People will spend 65 days in front of the TV, 41 days listening to radio
and a little over a week on the Internet in 2007. Adults will spend
about a week reading a daily newspaper and teens and adults will spend
another week listening to recorded music.

Other items:

- Among adults, 97 million Internet users sought news online in 2005,

- 13 million created a blog.

- The majority (79 percent) of freshmen in 1970 had an important
personal objective of "developing a meaningful philosophy of life." By
2005, the majority of freshmen (75 percent) said their primary objective
was "being very well off financially."

- Americans drank 23.2 gallons of bottled water per capita in 2004.
Consumption was only 2.7 gallons of bottled water in 1980.

- U.S. airports screened 738.6 million passengers in 2005, confiscating
9.4 million lighters.

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/miscellaneous/007871.html

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NNPA - The level of Black ownership of broadcast media, which has
fallen by 30 percent over the past nine years, is a "national disgrace"
and reflects overall retrenchment in the march toward justice and
equality, a member of the Federal Communications Commission has charged.
The commissioner, Michael J. Copps, made that assertion at a forum held
at the 10th annual Wall Street Project conference of Rainbow/PUSH. "The
facts are downright chilling," Copps stated. "While people of color make
up over 30 percent of our country's population, a study from Free Press
last fall tells us that they own only 3.26 percent of all broadcast
television stations. Unpack these numbers a little further and you'll
find that African-Americans own only 1.3 percent of all stations. And
it's sad to say, we're not making progress. "There has been no
improvement in the level of minority ownership since 1998, even as the
total universe of stations has increased by 12 percent. Truth is that
there has been a sharp drop in the total numbers of African-American
stations since 1998 – by 30 percent. This isn't just a problem. It's a
national disgrace."

http://blackpressusa.com/News/Article.asp?SID=3&Title=Hot+Stories&NewsID=11945

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MS MAGAZINE - The rate of intimate partner violence declined by more
than half from 1993 to 2004, according to a survey from the Bureau of
Justice Statistics, a division of the US Department of Justice. . .
According to the study, women are far more likely than men to be victims
of fatal and nonfatal violence by an intimate partner, regardless of
age, income, marital status or home ownership. Black women experience
nonfatal intimate violence at a higher rate than white women, and while
overall incidents of nonfatal violence have dropped, the rate of
nonfatal violence against black women actually increased from 2003 to
2004. People with low annual incomes and those living in rental housing
are also victimized at a higher rate than those who are wealthier and/or
own a home. The study also found a drastic decline in the number of male
victims of fatal intimate violence (from 1,348 incidents in 1976 to 385
in 2004), while the decrease for female victims has been much slower
(from 1,596 incidents in 1976 to 1,159 in 2004).

http://www.msmagazine.com/news/uswirestory.asp?ID=10076

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CHARLES STORCH, CHICAGO TRIBUNE - [A] report by the Johns Hopkins
University Center for Civil Society Studies found that U.S. charities
had 9.4 million paid workers and another 4.7 million "full-time
equivalent" volunteers, for a total workforce of 14.1 million as of
mid-2004, the latest date for such information. That paid employment
represented 7.1 percent of the country's total. . . The report also
found that employment at non-profits grew by an average 5.1 percent in
the U.S. from 2002 to 2004.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/lifestyle/chi-0612270459dec28,1,
3598713.story?coll=chi-leisuretempo-hed

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GENERATION NEXT

AP - The young adults of Generation Next are more optimistic, more
tolerant and more likely Democratic voters than their predecessors,
according to a new study. The group's tilt toward the Democratic Party
is far different from the previous younger generation, known as
Generation X, which grew up during the Reagan administration of the
1980s and was more inclined to support Republicans. . . Forty-eight
percent of young adults age 18 to 25 said they were Democrats or leaned
that direction while 35 percent said they were Republican or leaned that
way in 2006, according to Pew polling.

The study also found a great acceptance for same-sex marriage.
Forty-seven percent of those age 18 to 25 favor allowing gay men and
lesbians to marry while 30 percent of those 26 and older favor same-sex
marriage. . .

Asked about their generation, most say getting rich and being famous are
top goals.

The study found that the young adults:

- Are less inclined to vote than older generations, though young voter
turnout was up significantly in 2004. About 54 percent of those from 18
to 24 voted in 2004, and 74 percent of those 25 and over voted, Keeter
said.

- Have more liberal views than other generations on questions of race,
homosexuality and immigration.

- Read the newspaper and follow the news on TV and radio less than those
in older generations.

- Keep in close touch with their parents, both for advice and for
financial help.

http://uk.gay.com/headlines/10873

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CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR - In 2008, most people will live in cities
This demographic shift is mostly taking place in Africa and Asia,
largely in low-income settlements in developing countries - much of it
in the 22 "megacities" whose populations will exceed 10 million and in
some cases grow to more than 20 million by 2015. . . By 2015, there are
likely to be 59 African cities with populations between 1 million and 5
million, 65 such cities in Latin America and the Caribbean, and 253 in
Asia.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0112/p25s02-wogi.html

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