Discussion:
The managers with whom you met for coffee have asked you to prepare a report dealing with members of Congress. They asked you to research a random sample of 30 of the 100 senators about the following data groups:
Age
Years in the Senate
Party affiliation
Which ones vote favorably on legislation affecting your industry ("Y" or "YES") versus those voting unfavorably ("N" or "NO")
The income of each senator
The managers also want you to answer the following information using various Excel statistical tools:
What are the mean age, income, and number of years in the Senate?
What is the standard deviation of the income, and how would you interpret this?
How many senators make up the group with the least number of years in the Senate?
Voting preferences and party affiliation are not data that can be averaged because they are not numeric.
o What is this kind of data called, and how could it be grouped for statistical analysis methods?
Is picking 30 senators randomly a good way to reach conclusions?
o Must all 100 be assessed?
o Why or why not?