Questions, Anyone? Facts and Figures, the Best and Worst

We love statistics. We are crazy to know such unrelated facts as what movie star made the most money in 1990, what was the most popular mixed drink, what was the best-selling car in America.

The answer to those and almost any other question you might ask may be found in “Top Ten Almanac” (Workman), which lists 1990’s top 10 in almost every field imaginable.

There are a lot of statistics in the book that I wasn’t wild to know. For example, what was the biggest business deal (Time-Warner merger, $14.1 billion), what was the best performing stock (Cabletron Systems, +204%) and what was the biggest-spending national advertiser.

Before we get too far ahead of ourselves, I should say that the highest paid movie star was Arnold Schwarzenegger, $30 million (I find that incredible); the most popular mixed drink was the gin or vodka tonic and the best-selling car was the Honda Accord. It is interesting to note, however, that the next three were the Ford Taurus, Chevrolet Cavalier and Ford Escort and that six out of the top 10 were Ford or General Motors models.

It is depressing to note that, despite the widespread campaigns against smoking, Philip Morris was still the largest consumer product company with $39,069,000,000 in sales. And the best-selling grocery store item was Marlboros, at $1,509,000,000. Close behind Marlboros were Coke Classic at $1,278,000,000 and Pepsi at $1,222,000,000.

The numbers indicate the prodigious appetites of the American people and the staggering amounts of money made by those who feed them. The largest fast-food chain was McDonald’s, with 11,162 outlets and $17,333,000,000 in sales.

To promote their sales, Philip Morris (No. 1) spent $2,072,000,000 in advertising, Procter & Gamble (No. 2) spent $1,779,000,000 and Sears, Roebuck (No. 3) spent $1,432,000,000.

Our billionaires were rich beyond the dreams of Midas. Listed together, Forest E. Mars Sr., 89, and three children had $12.5 billion. That’s a lot of candy bars. Publisher Samuel I. Newhouse and family and Donald E. Newhouse and family netted out at $11.5 billion, which ought to spread pretty thick. Sam Moore Walton, of Walton’s discount stores, had a mere $7.3 billion.

The most valuable corporations, ranked by value of stock as of Dec. 31, 1990, were Exxon, $64.2 billion (don’t feel too bad about the cost of its oil spill); IBM, $63.8 billion, and General Electric, $50.2 billion.

Best paid chief executive was Craig O. McCaw of McCaw Cellular, $53,944,000; second was Steven J. Ross, Time Warner, $34,200,000; and third, Donald E. Pels, Lin Broadcasting, $22,791,000. I’ll bet those guys don’t even buy lottery tickets.

The only ones that I remember having heard of were way down the list: Michael D. Eisner, Walt Disney, ninth at $9,589,000, and August A. Busch III, Anheuser Busch, $8,861,000. Maybe Busch was paid that much because his beer, Budweiser, led all the rest in sales with 50,025,000 barrels.

Getting down from big money to the human level, we find that the three cities with the highest crime rates were Miami-Hialeah, New York and Los Angeles. The safest cities were Grand Forks, N.D.; Bismarck, N.D., and Sheboygan, Wis. It is interesting that two cities that provided vaudeville with jokes for years (Sheboygan and Kokomo, No. 10) are both on the list.

Perhaps we ought to be more anxious than proud that six of the 10 fastest-growing metropolitan areas in the nation are in California: Moreno Valley (1), Rancho Cucamonga (2), Irvine (4) Oceanside (6), Santa Clarita (7) and Escondido (8).

But three California cities are listed among the most livable metropolitan areas--San Francisco (No. 2 after Seattle), San Diego (5) and Anaheim-Santa Ana (8).

More gossip than factual is the list of worst-dressed women--Sinead O’Connor, Ivana Trump, Glenn Close, Queen Elizabeth II, Julia Roberts, Carrie Fisher, Kim Basinger, Laura Dern, Kathy Bates and Barbra Streisand. I wouldn’t know.

The 10 most appalling people and things of the year included the S&L; Hell, Saddam Hussein, Donald Trump and Cold Victory (“the end of two generations of the most extensive, most expensive standoff in world history, and it was barely noticed”). I noticed it.

Failure being as much fun to read about as success, it notes that the following movies lost the following amounts: “Havana” ($35 million) “Air America” ($25 million), “Mountains of the Moon” ($23.3 million), “Two Jakes” ($20 million), “Stanley & Iris” ($20 million), “Texasville” ($18.5 million), Gremlins II” ($17 million), “The Desperate Hours” ($16.6 million), “Bonfire of the Vanities” ($15 million) and “Loose Cannons” ($14 million).

Well, who knows? Maybe Philip Morris will belly up one of these years.

But I wouldn’t bet a Marlboro on it.