Picking on the SMH some more

19 Aug 2005

In today’s paper, an article entitled “Wages crack the $1000 barrier“, came this spot of genius.

A pay packet of $1000 a week is no longer anything to brag about.

Full-time adult ordinary-time earnings – the benchmark for Australia’s average wage – rose to $1008.10 a week in the three months to May 31, or $52,432 a year, the Bureau of Statistics announced yesterday.

Full-time women workers are yet to reach the new pay landmark, averaging $906 a week compared with men on $1064.

Right, so, I’m throwing in a disclaimer here. I don’t do maths as a subject, and haven’t for a while. But I think I know how to average two numbers — correct me if I’m wrong. It goes something like “add them together, and divide by two”.

Women earn $906, men earn $1064. That adds to be $1970. We’re already guessing it’s wrong, because it’s impossible to get 10 cents from that. But hey, I’ll do the sum anyway: it’s $985. And no cents.

It seems there’s more than a few workers of dubious gender in Australia…

Ah, it appears Nick has discovered where I went wrong. The ten cents thing did seem a little too… odd… to be straight out incorrect!