Can you get 拢71,000 on benefits?
Tim Harford investigates benefit claims, global GDP, church attacks, sauna temperature and marathon running.
Tim Harford investigates some of the numbers in the news. This week:
Is it true that someone needs to earn 拢71,000 before they receive more money than a family on benefits?
Did Canadian prime minister Mark Carney get the GDP of Canada and the Nordic countries wrong?
Are 1990s pop icons Right Said Fred right about what they said about church attacks?
Is a sauna really ten times as hot as Wales in the winter?
And Tim hits the science lab treadmill to find out if he can run a four-hour marathon.
If you鈥檝e seen a number in the news you want the team on More or Less to have a look at, email moreorless@bbc.co.uk
Contributors:
Gareth Morgan, benefits expert and author of the Benefits in the Future blog
Joe Shalam, policy director of the Centre for Social Justice
Professor Kelly Morrison, head of physics at Loughborough University
Dr Danny Muniz, a senior lecturer in Exercise Physiology at the University of Hertfordshire
Credits:
Presenter: Tim Harford
Reporters: Nathan Gower, Lizzy McNeill and Tom Colls
Production co-ordinator: Brenda Brown
Sound mix: Gareth Jones and James Beard
Editor: Richard Vadon
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Broadcasts
- Last Wednesday 09:00麻豆社 Radio 4
- Last Friday 16:30麻豆社 Radio 4
Unlock the history and truth behind the data with The OU
Explore how numbers shape, and sometimes mislead us, with The Open University.

