Category Archives: Topics

Sales Tax Collections Increase in Oklahoma

According to Stateline.org, sales tax collections have been on the rise in the last six months for some states, Oklahoma and West Virginia among others. They are expected to grow even more during the months of November and December 2010.  As can be seen in the graph below, sales tax collections have been on the rise except for the period between the fourth quarter 2008 and the first quarter 2010.

 

The second quarter 2010 shows an increase in sales tax collection of 9.4% with respect to the previous quarter.

Sales tax revenue is the second largest source of tax collections after individual income tax revenue for the state of Oklahoma as can be seen in the chart below.

World Murder Rates

The number of intentional homicides by country, and the rate of homicides per 100,000 population is shown in the table below.

  Counts Rates per 100,000
Country 2005 2006 2005 2006
Algeria 204 214 0.62 0.64
Argentina 2,115 2,052 5.46 5.24
Armenia 55 75 1.82 2.49
Austria 54 61 0.65 0.73
Azerbaijan 192 190 2.30 2.26
Bahrain 4 7 0.55 0.95
Bangladesh 3,431 4,123 2.24 2.64
Belarus 836 734 8.53 7.53
Belize 81 92 29.40 32.67
Bolivia 478 454 5.21 4.85
Bosnia and Herzegovina 70 73 1.79 1.86
Brunei Darussalam 0 2 0.00 0.52
Canada 663 606 2.05 1.86
Costa Rica 338 348 7.81 7.91
Croatia 68 74 1.49 1.62
Cyprus 16 14 1.91 1.66
Czech Republic 104 136 1.02 1.33
Denmark 53 29 0.98 0.53
Dominican Republic 1,666 1,537 17.59 15.99
Ecuador 2,121 2,385 16.24 18.07
Egypt 364 440 0.50 0.59
El Salvador 3,779 3,927 56.67 58.07
England and Wales 766 755 1.43 1.41
Estonia 113 91 8.41 6.79
Finland 113 112 2.15 2.13
Georgia 403 323 9.01 7.29
Germany 780 727 0.94 0.88
Greece 127 109 1.14 0.98
India 32,719 32,481 2.88 2.82
Ireland 65 67 1.57 1.59
Italy 610 625 1.04 1.06
Jordan 67 100 1.21 1.75
Kazakhstan 1,804 1,729 11.86 11.29
Kenya 2,313 2,090 6.50 5.72
Kyrgyzstan 491 446 9.44 8.48
Latvia 130 148 5.65 6.47
Lebanon 94 23 2.34 0.57
Liechtenstein 0 0 0.00 0.00
Lithuania 369 277 10.77 8.13
Malaysia 497 604 1.94 2.31
Malta 4 0 0.99 0.00
Mauritius 37 50 2.98 4.00
Mexico 11,372 11,558 10.91 10.97
Monaco 1 1 3.08 3.07
Mongolia 310 311 12.01 11.94
Montenegro 22 25 3.62 4.16
Morocco 160 162 0.52 0.53
Nepal 564 509 2.08 1.84
Netherlands 197 159 1.21 0.97
New Zealand 61 47 1.49 1.14
Nicaragua 436 465 7.98 8.41
Northern Ireland 26 23 1.51 1.33
Norway 33 33 0.71 0.71
Occupied Palestinian Territory 145 3.85
Panama 364 363 11.26 11.04
Paraguay 887 742 15.02 12.33
Philippines 3,240 3,296 3.83 3.82
Poland 555 490 1.45 1.28
Portugal 175 227 1.66 2.15
Republic of Moldova 226 184 5.83 4.80
Romania 457 438 2.11 2.03
Scotland 81 109 1.59 2.13
Serbia 142 144 1.44 1.46
Singapore 21 17 0.49 0.39
Slovakia 72 65 1.34 1.21
Slovenia 20 12 1.00 0.60
Spain 405 336 0.93 0.77
Sweden 127 115 1.41 1.27
Switzerland 75 60 1.01 0.80
Syrian Arab Republic 206 239 1.09 1.23
Tajikistan 157 228 2.40 3.43
Thailand 5,141 5,023 8.16 7.92
The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia 44 41 2.16 2.01
Turkey 3,082 2,999 4.22 4.06
Turkmenistan 162 142 3.35 2.90
Ukraine 3,030 2,958 6.46 6.35
United Arab Emirates 56 39 1.36 0.92
United States of America 16,740 17,034 5.58 5.62


These figures are collected by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime through its Survey of Crime Trends. Its definition of intentional homicide is “death deliberately inflicted on a person by another person, including infanticide”.

Total Consumer Credit Outstanding in the US

A sobering graph from the St. Louis Fed shows the total consumer credit outstanding in the US. It’s clear from the graph that consumer borrowing went into overdrive starting in the early 1990s. The big question for creditors now is how much of the borrowed money will be paid back while unemployment continues to increase.

Total consumer credit outstanding in the US

Source: Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

Mobile Phone Penetration in Brazil

The cell phone penetration rate in Brazil as of 2007 was 63.6%, according to the Brazilian National Telecommunications Agency. With a population of almost 200 million people, Brazil is one of the World’s largest markets for mobile phone manufacturers. The chart below shows mobile phone penetration in Brazil from 2002 thru 2007.

Mobile phone penetration in Brazil 2002-2007

Source: National Telecommunications Agency of Brazil

See also: Mobile phone penetration in China and in India

Mobile Phone Penetration in India

According to the Department of Telecommunications of India, there were 346.9 million wireless telephones in India as of December 2008. Using a total population of 1,147,995,904 (July 2008 estimate), the penetration rate of cell phones was 30.2%. For comparison purposes, the penetration rate as of December 2007 was only 20.7%. In other words, the number of mobile phones in India increased by 113 million in 12 months, an astounding 48.5% growth rate.

You may also want to compare India’s mobile phone penetration to China’s mobile phone penetration.

Mobile Phone Adoption in China

Cell phone penetration in China as of 2006 was only 35.3 handsets per 100 people. Considering that the population of China is over 1.3 billion, we can estimate that there are at least 463 million mobile handsets in operation. More interestingly, given that mobile phone penetration rates in more advanced countries are over 75%, as China continues to develop the market for cell phones will more than double in size.

The chart below shows mobile phone adoption in China from 2002-2006.

Mobile phone adoption in China 2002-2006

Source: National Bureau of Statistics of China