Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2016 October 31

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October 31

Statistics on paying for dinner

I am looking for statistics regarding expectations of who should pay for meals, and other expenses such as movie tickets, when a (heterosexual) couple goes on a date in modern North American culture. Specifically, statistics addressing the following issues would be greatly appreciated:

• whether the man should pay by default or whether the bill should be split;
• whether, if the woman offers to pay either in full or in part, the man should decline this and offer to pay for all expenses.

I am not looking for the opinions of individual reference desk editors or of bloggers on either feminist blogs or the manosphere, as these are unlikely to be representative of the wider population. Rather, I am interested in reliable statistics that reflect the views of ordinary people. I am particularly interested in studies which are as recent as possible, and which specifically describe the views of women between the ages of 20 and 30; however, the views of the overall population would also be of interest.

Information from outside of Canada and the United States, or information related to dating among LGBT couples, is not relevant to my current investigation.

Thank you kindly for any information which you may provide.--129.97.125.27 (talk) 00:46, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Here are some reliable sources on the issue: 2008 article from NBC News. 2014 article from Slate.com. 2014 article from NerdWallet. 2015 article from CNN Money. The NerdWallet seems to be pretty heavy in the sort of stats you are looking for. --Jayron32 00:52, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Thank you very much. This is precisely the sort of information I was looking for. --2620:101:F000:700:7034:8808:755C:DA23 (talk) 17:15, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

"Some guys are cheap on a date, and complain if their girl orders something expensive. Not me, I tell her 'Babe,I hit the ATM right before our date, so you go ahead and order whatever you want. Your worth it. I mean, heck, if you feel like it, you can even order the Big Mac'." - StuRat (talk) 04:02, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

CIA document

This CIA document says that the names of Konstantinos Karamanlis, former Prime Minister and President of Greece, uncle of former Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis and founder of the modern Nea Dimokratia party, now the official opposition, and Konstantinos Tsaldaris, also former Prime Minister, appeared in a list of German agents during the Occupation, who aided Nazi officer Max Merten in the destruction of the Jews of Salonica. Is it a genuine, reliable source? May I use it in these articles to source these claims?

P.S.

Disclaimer: I posted this on the reference desk instead of the talk pages deliberately. The question is more about the document itself and its reliablity as a source than about its inclusion in the articles.

2A02:587:290E:B800:1D32:EC47:9BA2:6DE5 (talk) 16:14, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

The document also claims that Gideon Hausner himself agreed to protect Karamanlis' anonimity. 2A02:587:290E:B800:1D32:EC47:9BA2:6DE5 (talk) 16:17, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

The document is a primary source and so itself probably would not be favored over a secondary source such as a journal, book, or similar source which reports on what that document says. Primary sources are of extremely limited utility, and are usually not used for what could be highly contentious information like this. I would find someone who has researched and vetted all possible sources of information, and drawn reliable conclusions based on their recognized expertise. That's what a good secondary source does. See here. --Jayron32 18:11, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

• Given this is posted at the CIA website, there is no question as to the provenance. All that's necessary to use this in an article is to follow WP:ATTRIBUTE; i.e., say "according to a document published by the CIA, "blah blah blah" [citation]. μηδείς (talk) 20:16, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

• Yes, but what is that document? Who wrote it? To whom are they writing? What was the purpose of the document? No one at Wikipedia can determine any of that. I should also note that being hosted on a CIA website does NOT make it a CIA report. Indeed, I don't know many CIA reports, written by the CIA, which would be written in Greek. --Jayron32 01:10, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Calm down, Jayron. I am not about to argue the case here, it still belongs at the talk page. But if you are responding to what I actually said, I did not say a "CIA report", I said a "document published by the CIA". You and the OP can take this up at the target article, I have no third cent to add. μηδείς (talk) 04:37, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

If you are going to give bad advice in a certain venue, you should expect that bad advice to be refuted in that same venue. If you would have preferred your bad advice to be refuted on the article talk page, you should have given your bad advice on that article talk page. --Jayron32 13:10, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

There's more to it than that. This document was classified information which has been declassified. I can't imagine that any information would get to be classified unless it had been very carefully vetted. 86.146.168.153 (talk) 14:55, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

I think that you're mistaken. There is nothing that says that a document can be classified only if the facts are accurate. Reasons to classify a document known to be incorrect might be because it would be against a country's interests to do so, e.g. because it would reveal how much it knows or because releasing a document which mentions a foreign national might hurt relations with that nation. Sjö (talk) 15:06, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

"To be known to be incorrect" is not the same thing as "To not be known to be correct". We can accept neither as a reliable source at Wikipedia. --Jayron32 16:49, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

You might want to try asking this question at the reliable sources noticeboard. -165.234.252.11 (talk) 19:18, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

US presidential candidates

I am surprised by the relatively small number of names at United States third-party and independent presidential candidates, 2016. Obviously I understand that running a credible national campaign requires the sort of money that few people could find, but this list includes people who have "no ballot access", which I imagine means they are hardly running a campaign even in one state. As far as I can tell, anyone -- including any nutcase or self-publicist -- can run, provided they satisfy very basic citizenship requirements. In a country of over 300 million people, I wonder why there are there not many more people on that list, especially in the "minor independent candidates" categories. 109.148.99.157 (talk) 18:55, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure if there's a specific consensus at that page for what merits inclusion, but in general on Wikipedia, a person or campaign would need to have some sense of notability supported by significant coverage in reliable and independent sources before they would be mentioned anywhere. I'm sure there are more candidates than what's listed at that article (there seem to be some listed at United States presidential election, 2016 that aren't on the third-party and independent page), but I'd guess they are missing because they haven't fulfilled the notability requirement, perhaps by being too unlikely or uninteresting to warrant any attention from reliable sources. clpo13_(talk) 19:05, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree with your general statement. Certainly the articles I have seen on British parliamentary elections seem to list all the candidates, even the least notable independents, fringe candidates, nutcases, etc.. There may be no further biographical information about the non-notables on Wikipedia, but simply by running they are deemed worthy of inclusion in the list of candidates. I'm not saying you're not correct about the incompleteness of United States third-party and independent presidential candidates, 2016, or arguing that it should be complete if it isn't, just commenting on the general point. 109.148.99.157 (talk) 20:33, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Well, it could also simply be that no one's bothered to add them. United States presidential election, 2016 has 528 page watchers while United States third-party and independent presidential candidates, 2016 has only 72. That's a significant difference that suggests to me that few people even realize the latter article exists. I suspect that most people who are looking to add a minor or fringe candidate would probably go straight for the main election page. clpo13_(talk) 20:50, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

• In the UK, there is no write-in candidacy, so the list of candidates is at least closed, and because all you need to do to get on the ballot is pay your £500 deposit, there's no-one in the weird in-between area of campaigning for ballot access. Plus, because it's a parliamentary system not a presidential one, a fringe party or independent candidate can win a constituency even if they don't get anywhere near power. In the US, by contrast, there are genuine no-hopers - people who cannot win the election, because the laws of maths won't allow it. James Hedges could pick up every 100% of the vote in every state he has access, and still be 250 electoral college votes short. Smurrayinchester 10:14, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

There is a list here - http://www.politics1.com/p2016.htm - of the 31 candidates whose names appear on the ballot paper of at least one state - plus a very long list (which I can't be bothered to count) of all of the write-in candidates who have put their names forward somewhere. Wymspen (talk) 09:37, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

http://writein2008.blogspot.dk about the 2008 election shows that in many states a write-in candidate needed signed declarations from the vice president candidate and/or the people wanted as electors. That is a hurdle for some nutcases. States have 3 to 55 electors. Some states didn't allow write-in candidates. There were also states where write-in candidates didn't even have to sign anything or register anywhere. I don't know 2016 rules. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:47, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, there are 539 names on the long list (paste into Word and then apply numbering!). This is getting closer to the sort of numbers that I would expect. 31 on any ballot is a bit surprising to me though (low-ish). 109.149.185.65 (talk) 12:47, 1 November 2016 (UTC)