When families were asked what they could not live without on family car trips, percentage who said music, according to a survey conducted on behalf of CarMax: 46

Percentage who said movies: 17

Percentage who said books: 16

Percentage who said gaming devices: 11

Source: CarMax.

Though Nike is not an official World Cup sponsor, thanks to some creative marketing, their percentage of the "World Cup buzz," according to The Nielsen Company: 30.2

Percentage of "the buzz" attributed to Adidas, a FIFA partner: 14.4

Of the 32 teams participating in the World Cup finals, number that will be wearing Nike uniforms, including the U.S. and Australia, compared to 12 for Adidas: 9

Source: Nielsen Media Research.

Perhaps due to frugality fatigue, percentage surge in upper-income Americans' self-reported spending, rising to an average of $145 per day in May, up from $109 per day in May 2009, and the highest monthly average since November 2008, according to a Gallup Poll: 33

Source: Gallup.

Percentage of the public who say it is more difficult to be a mother today than it was 20 or 30 years ago, according to a national survey by the Pew Research Center: 70

Percentage who say the same about being a father: 60

Percentage of Americans who say that mothers are doing a worse job today than mothers did 20 or 30 years ago: 56

Source: Pewsocialtrends.org.

Percentage of Asians in the U.S. who have a bachelor's degree or higher education, according to figures announced by the the U.S. Census Bureau: 53

Percentage of non-Hispanic whites: 33

Percentage of African-Americans: 20

Percentage of Hispanics: 13

Source: U.S. Census Bureau.

According to economists' estimates, percentage of consumers who are supporting relatives due to the market downturn, according to the results from a survey by AXA Equitable Life Insurance Co.: 25

Percentage of consumers who have say they have begun to do so: 16

Source: AXA Equitable Life Insurance Co.

Percentage of men who shave at least five times per week who report that they are living their dreams, according to the Schick Skin-dex survey: 76

Percentage of men who shave fewer than five times who say the same: 64

Source: Schick.

Ranks of health care, clean/green technology, and energy/utilities and manufacturing (tie) on the list of industries expected to generate the greatest growth in six-figure jobs, according to a survey by ExecuNet: 1, 2, 3 (tie)

Ranks of business development, sales and engineering on the list of management functions expected to be in the greatest demand during the next 12 months: 1, 2, 3

Source: ExecuNet.

Percentage of leaders from North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific who consider high-potential talent management programming (designed for employees who have the capability to take on significantly more responsibility and challenges to climb several levels beyond a current role) as a critical business investment during the upswing of 2010, according to a PDI Ninth House conducted study by Weber Shandwick: 66

Percentage of leaders who said they kept their high-potential program going through the downturn and will continue to do so: 38

Source: Dice Report.

Idle Thought

"Life is something that happens when you can't get to sleep." -- Fran Leibowitz, author

(Readers can contact John MacIntyre at johnmacintyre(at)bwr.eastlink.ca.)

Dear old dad, it seems, is a little starved for attention, even on his big day -- projected amount consumers will spend on Father's Day, according to BIGresearch: $8.23 billion

Estimated amount consumers spent for Mother's Day: $11.25 billion

Rank of Father's Day as the year's busiest collect-call day for AT&T: 1

Source: BIGresearch.

Percentage of all new marriages in the U.S. in 2008 that were between spouses of a different race or ethnicity from one another, according to a report by the Pew Research Center's Social and Demographic Trends project: 14.6

Percentage of respondents who say they have an immediate family member or close relative who is married to someone of a different race: 35

Source: Pewsocialtrends.org.

As of the first week of June, number of tweets that had been sent by Twitter's 105 million users, according to the findings of a Harris Poll: 15 billion

Estimated number of active users on Facebook -- more members than the populations of Japan, Mexico and Russia combined: 400 million

Percentage of online Americans who use social media: 64

Source: Harris Interactive.

Percentage of small-business owners who say they would give up 10 percent of their company in exchange for a guarantee that they'd be protected from negative economic effects in 2010, according to a survey released by Brother International Corp.: 15

Percentage of small-business owners who say that the economy has taken a toll on their well-being and who find that their stress level is at the highest it's ever been: 51

Source: Brother International Corp.

Percentage of consumers who said they would miss aspects of reading paper books if they switched to reading e-books: 41

Ranks of touch (36 percent), portability (13 percent) and making notes (13 percent) on the list of the top aspects consumers said they would miss most: 1, 2, 3

Source: PriceGrabber.com.

Percentage of workers who said they have less than $10,000 in savings (excludes the value of primary homes and defined-benefit pension plans), up from 39 percent in 2009, according to the EBRI 2010 Retirement Confidence survey: 43

Percentage who said they had less than $1,000, up from 20 percent in 2009: 27

Percentage who say they have confidence in their ability to save enough for a comfortable retirement, the second lowest point in the 20-year history of the survey: 16

Source: EBRI.

Percentage of Americans with a positive opinion about the federal government's handling of a British Petroleum oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, according to a Zogby Interactive survey: 16

Percentage of respondents who have a positive opinion of British Petroleum's handling of the spill: 14 (Down 11 percentage points since the previous poll in late May.)

Source: Zogby International.

Percentage of global consumers who say online content of any kind will have to be considerably better than what is currently free before they will pay for it, according to a Nielsen survey across 52 countries: 71

Percentage of people who would no longer use a website that charges them: 79

Percentage who believe that once they purchase content, it should be theirs to copy or share with whomever they want: 62

Source: Nielsen Analytics.

Percentage of Americans who deem terrorism and federal government debt as their most worrisome issues when they consider threats to the future well-being of the U.S., according to a Gallup Poll: 79

Percentage who call each an "extremely serious" threat: 40

Source: Gallup.

Percentage of companies that outsource their IT infrastructure today, according to a study commissioned by Savvis Inc.: 17

Predicted percentage that will outsource their IT infrastructure in 2020: 64

Source: Savvis.

Idle Thought

"It is better to sleep on things beforehand than lie awake about them afterwards." -- Baltasar Gracian, philosopher and writer

(Readers can contact John MacIntyre at johnmacintyre(at)bwr.eastlink.ca.)

Percentage of teens who send more than 100 text messages a day, or 3,000 texts a month: 33

Percentage who send 50 or more text messages a day, or 1,500 texts a month: 50

Source: Pew Internet and American Life Project.

Percentage of consumers who said they would miss aspects of reading paper books if they switched to reading e-books: 41

Ranks of touch (36 percent), portability (13 percent) and making notes (13 percent) on the list of the top aspects consumers mentioned said they would miss most: 1, 2, 3

Source: PriceGrabber.com.

Ranks of Vienna, Zurich, Geneva, Vancouver and Auckland on the list of cities with the world's best quality of living, according to Mercer's 2010 Quality of Living Survey: 1, 2, 3, 4(tie)

Ranks of Honolulu and San Francisco on the list (the top-ranked U.S. cities for overall quality of living): 31, 32

Rank of Baghdad, at the bottom of the list: 221

Source: Mercer.

Percentage of singles who confessed to negative feelings about the wedding season, according to a poll by CatholicMatch.com: 20

Percentage who said that they're dreading it: 13

Percentage who said that it would be "kind of a drag": 7

Source: CatholicMatch.com.

Percentage of Americans who agree that many of the jobs lost during the recession are not likely to come back, and that many employers will ask more of current employees instead of hiring new ones, according to a Zogby poll: 60

Percentage who believe America's best days still lie ahead: 43

Source: Zogby International.

Percentage of human resources managers who said formal evaluations are effective in improving employee performance, according to a survey by OfficeTeam: 91

Percentage who said they were very effective: 40

Source: OfficeTeam.

Increase in the demand for temporary workers in the U.S. over the same period in 2009, according to the Palmer Forecast: 10.8

According to the Sterling Resource Funding Corp. -- a company that provides funding to over 300 staffing companies -- percentage of its clients that are expanding in 2010: 80

In 2009, percentage that were shrinking: 80

Source: Palmer Forecast.

Percentage of U.S. travelers who plan to take leisure trips this summer, according to the results of TripAdvisor's annual summer travel survey: 91

Percentage of travelers who will take seven or more days of vacation this summer: 80

Percentage who say the recent volatility in the stock market impacts their plans: 11

Source: TripAdvisor.

Percentage of Americans who choose to eat a chocolate based on conditions that include their mood, the occasion, the time of day and even the weather, according to a survey by Lindt Chocolate: 61

Percentage of Americans who agree choosing their own chocolate is just as personal a decision as making their own menu choice: 70

Percentage of women who believe choosing their chocolate is just as personal a decision as selecting their lipstick or makeup: 66

Source: Opinion Research Corp.

Percentage of working mothers with children younger than age 5 who said they didn't have enough time to do what they needed to do "yesterday," according to the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index: 41

Percentage of working mothers with older children who said the same: 34

Percentage of working women with no children younger than 18 who said the same: 28

Source: Gallup.

Idle Thought

"One is happy as a result of one's own efforts once one knows the necessary ingredients of happiness: simple tastes, a certain degree of courage, self denial to a point, love of work, and above all, a clear conscience." -- George Sand

(Readers can contact John MacIntyre at johnmacintyre(at)bwr.eastlink.ca.)