Free Republic

If you’ve managed to make it this far in life without quite figuring out what demographic boxes to tick on the Census form, a recent working paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research might have some clues for you. According to the Washington Post, University of Chicago economists Marianne Bertrand and Emir Kamenica “taught machines to guess a person’s income, political ideology, race, education, and gender based on either their media habits, their consumer behavior, their social and political beliefs, and even how they spent their time.” The results are, at times, surprisingly granular and seemingly nonsensical: Owning...

EVANSVILLE, Ind. (AP) -- Ruth M. Siems, a home economist who helped create Stove Top stuffing, a Thanksgiving favorite that will be on dinner tables across the country this year, has died at 74. Siems, who worked for General Foods for more than 30 years, died Nov. 13 in Newburgh, Ind., after suffering a heart attack in her home. Siems helped develop Stove Top in 1971 while working at General Foods' technical center in White Plains, N.Y. She was listed first among four inventors when the patent was awarded in 1975 for the quick and easy way of making stuffing...