LOCKDOWNS WERE particularly frustrating for football devotees, who had no live matches to watch while stuck at home. But the fans most pleased by the sport’s return may be statisticians. For them, empty stadiums are not a cheerless last resort, but rather a chance to tackle a great quandary: why do travelling teams tend to lose?

Most studies have blamed referees for trying to placate fans. In one experiment, officials were shown recorded games and asked how they would have ruled. They were kinder to home sides when they could hear baying fans than when the sound was muted. Some analyses of live matches have found more bias with denser crowds. Before this summer, few competitive fixtures were played without fans. One study from this May found just 160 cases since 2002. In this small sample, the home team’s edge vanished. Referees gave similar numbers of cards for fouls to both sides, and visitors won almost as often as hosts did.

This finding could easily be skewed...

AT THE beginning of spring much of Europe shut down to slow the spread of covid-19, which has infected nearly 3m people and taken the lives of about 200,000 in the continent’s 54 countries and territories, from the Atlantic to the Urals. The first wave of infections appears largely to have abated. Countries are returning to some semblance of normality—albeit with social-distancing measures in place. Now that governments are loosening restrictions on their citizens, the fear is that the virus could return.

Whether it is a second wave or just the continuation of the first, one thing is certain: covid-19 in America is getting worse. On July 23rd the number of confirmed cases in the country surpassed 4m, with new infections increasing at an alarming rate of 70,000 a day. President Donald Trump, who has sought to downplay the severity of the pandemic, conceded on July 21st that things “will get worse before they get better”.

LOCKDOWNS WERE particularly frustrating for football devotees, who had no live matches to watch while stuck at home. But the fans most pleased by the sport’s return may be statisticians. For them, empty stadiums are not a cheerless last resort, but rather a chance to tackle a great quandary: why do travelling teams tend to lose?

Most studies have blamed referees for trying to placate fans. In one experiment, officials were shown recorded games and asked how they would have ruled. They were kinder to home sides when they could hear baying fans than when the sound was muted. Some analyses of live matches have found more bias with denser crowds. Before this summer, few competitive fixtures were played without fans. One study from this May found just 160 cases since 2002. In this small sample, the home team’s edge vanished. Referees gave similar numbers of cards for fouls to both sides, and visitors won almost as often as hosts did.

This finding could easily be skewed...

Whether it is a second wave or just the continuation of the first, one thing is certain: covid-19 in America is getting worse. On July 23rd the number of confirmed cases in the country surpassed 4m, with new infections increasing at an alarming rate of 70,000 a day. President Donald Trump, who has sought to downplay the severity of the pandemic, conceded on July 21st that things “will get worse before they get better”.

LOCKDOWNS WERE particularly frustrating for football devotees, who had no live matches to watch while stuck at home. But the fans most pleased by the sport’s return may be statisticians. For them, empty stadiums are not a cheerless last resort, but rather a chance to tackle a great quandary: why do travelling teams tend to lose?

Most studies have blamed referees for trying to placate fans. In one experiment, officials were shown recorded games and asked how they would have ruled. They were kinder to home sides when they could hear baying fans than when the sound was muted. Some analyses of live matches have found more bias with denser crowds. Before this summer, few competitive fixtures were played without fans. One study from this May found just 160 cases since 2002. In this small sample, the home team’s edge vanished. Referees gave similar numbers of cards for fouls to both sides, and visitors won almost as often as hosts did.

This finding could easily be skewed...

AT THE beginning of spring much of Europe shut down to slow the spread of covid-19, which has infected nearly 3m people and taken the lives of about 200,000 in the continent’s 54 countries and territories, from the Atlantic to the Urals. The first wave of infections appears largely to have abated. Countries are returning to some semblance of normality—albeit with social-distancing measures in place. Now that governments are loosening restrictions on their citizens, the fear is that the virus could return.

Whether it is a second wave or just the continuation of the first, one thing is certain: covid-19 in America is getting worse. On July 23rd the number of confirmed cases in the country surpassed 4m, with new infections increasing at an alarming rate of 70,000 a day. President Donald Trump, who has sought to downplay the severity of the pandemic, conceded on July 21st that things “will get worse before they get better”.

Whether it is a second wave or just the continuation of the first, one thing is certain: covid-19 in America is getting worse. On July 23rd the number of confirmed cases in the country surpassed 4m, with new infections increasing at an alarming rate of 70,000 a day. President Donald Trump, who has sought to downplay the severity of the pandemic, conceded on July 21st that things “will get worse before they get better”.

LOCKDOWNS WERE particularly frustrating for football devotees, who had no live matches to watch while stuck at home. But the fans most pleased by the sport’s return may be statisticians. For them, empty stadiums are not a cheerless last resort, but rather a chance to tackle a great quandary: why do travelling teams tend to lose?

Most studies have blamed referees for trying to placate fans. In one experiment, officials were shown recorded games and asked how they would have ruled. They were kinder to home sides when they could hear baying fans than when the sound was muted. Some analyses of live matches have found more bias with denser crowds. Before this summer, few competitive fixtures were played without fans. One study from this May found just 160 cases since 2002. In this small sample, the home team’s edge vanished. Referees gave similar numbers of cards for fouls to both sides, and visitors won almost as often as hosts did.

This finding could easily be skewed...

AT THE beginning of spring much of Europe shut down to slow the spread of covid-19, which has infected nearly 3m people and taken the lives of about 200,000 in the continent’s 54 countries and territories, from the Atlantic to the Urals. The first wave of infections appears largely to have abated. Countries are returning to some semblance of normality—albeit with social-distancing measures in place. Now that governments are loosening restrictions on their citizens, the fear is that the virus could return.

AT THE beginning of spring much of Europe shut down to slow the spread of covid-19, which has infected nearly 3m people and taken the lives of about 200,000 in the continent’s 54 countries and territories, from the Atlantic to the Urals. The first wave of infections appears largely to have abated. Countries are returning to some semblance of normality—albeit with social-distancing measures in place. Now that governments are loosening restrictions on their citizens, the fear is that the virus could return.

LOCKDOWNS WERE particularly frustrating for football devotees, who had no live matches to watch while stuck at home. But the fans most pleased by the sport’s return may be statisticians. For them, empty stadiums are not a cheerless last resort, but rather a chance to tackle a great quandary: why do travelling teams tend to lose?

Most studies have blamed referees for trying to placate fans. In one experiment, officials were shown recorded games and asked how they would have ruled. They were kinder to home sides when they could hear baying fans than when the sound was muted. Some analyses of live matches have found more bias with denser crowds. Before this summer, few competitive fixtures were played without fans. One study from this May found just 160 cases since 2002. In this small sample, the home team’s edge vanished. Referees gave similar numbers of cards for fouls to both sides, and visitors won almost as often as hosts did.

This finding could easily be skewed...

BY NOW HIP-HOP fans are all too familiar with the success that can come after an artist’s untimely death. Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G, two American rappers who were murdered in 1996 and 1997, respectively, have released more music in death than in life. Other well-known rappers to notch up hits after their deaths include Eazy-E (1995), Big L (2000) and J Dilla (2006). The past few years have seen a flurry of such posthumous hits. Last week Juice WRLD, a rapper who died in December, debuted atop America’s Billboard charts with his second album, “Legends Never Die”. By one reckoning, it is the most successful posthumous release in two decades.

An analysis by The Economist suggests that, in the world of hip-hop at least, the sales boost generated by posthumous albums may be growing. We looked at recent releases by hip-hop artists Lil Peep, XXXTentacion, Mac Miller, Pop Smoke and Juice WRLD. To measure the commercial success of a release, we used the Album-Equivalent...

SHANGHAI’S STAR market, a stock exchange for China’s home-grown technology firms, celebrates its first birthday today. It has much to cheer about. Launched with an ambition to rival Nasdaq, a venue in New York where many American tech giants are listed, the toddler has surpassed the older ChiNext exchange in Shenzhen and already ranks second globally by capital raised in IPOs so far this year. And it just received a lovely present. On July 20th Ant Group, the financial-services arm of Alibaba, an e-commerce giant, said it had chosen STAR as one of two exchanges on which it is planning its long-awaited listing (the other winner is Hong Kong, which has also grown popular among fast-growing Chinese companies). Though the exact size and timing of the offering are still unknown, it could well turn out to be the largest IPO ever. Ant was last valued at $150bn in 2018; listing even a small portion of its shares could place it above Saudi Aramco’s IPO last year, the largest yet at...

THE BIG MAC index was invented by The Economist in 1986 as a lighthearted guide to whether currencies are at their “correct” level. It is based on the theory of purchasing-power parity (PPP), the notion that in the long run exchange rates should move towards the rate that would equalise the prices of an identical basket of goods and services (in this case, a burger) in any two countries.

SHANGHAI’S STAR market, a stock exchange for China’s home-grown technology firms, celebrates its first birthday today. It has much to cheer about. Launched with an ambition to rival Nasdaq, a venue in New York where many American tech giants are listed, the toddler has surpassed the older ChiNext exchange in Shenzhen and already ranks second globally by capital raised in IPOs so far this year. And it just received a lovely present. On July 20th Ant Group, the financial-services arm of Alibaba, an e-commerce giant, said it had chosen STAR as one of two exchanges on which it is planning its long-awaited listing (the other winner is Hong Kong, which has also grown popular among fast-growing Chinese companies). Though the exact size and timing of the offering are still unknown, it could well turn out to be the largest IPO ever. Ant was last valued at $150bn in 2018; listing even a small portion of its shares could place it above Saudi Aramco’s IPO last year, the largest yet at...

DURING THE pandemic, young people have often been accused of endangering their elders by flocking to beaches and returning prematurely to cafes, restaurants and bars. But younger folk are no more cavalier about the coronavirus than their older counterparts. In fact the evidence suggests that, if anything, it is old people who underestimate the risks posed by the virus.

In a new working paper, researchers from Harvard University, Bocconi University and the University of Oxford report the results of a survey in May of more than 1,500 Americans about the health risks posed by covid-19 for themselves and others. The preliminary results show that respondents aged 18-34 consider themselves to be nearly three times more likely to contract the disease than respondents over 70 do. On average, they reckon they have a 8.75% chance of catching it; over-70s put their own risk at only 3% (see chart). The authors suggest that this may be because young people have more active lives and...

DURING THE pandemic, young people have often been accused of endangering their elders by flocking to beaches and returning prematurely to cafes, restaurants and bars. But younger folk are no more cavalier about the coronavirus than their older counterparts. In fact the evidence suggests that, if anything, it is old people who underestimate the risks posed by the virus.

In a new working paper, researchers from Harvard University, Bocconi University and the University of Oxford report the results of a survey in May of more than 1,500 Americans about the health risks posed by covid-19 for themselves and others. The preliminary results show that respondents aged 18-34 consider themselves to be nearly three times more likely to contract the disease than respondents over 70 do. On average, they reckon they have a 8.75% chance of catching it; over-70s put their own risk at only 3% (see chart). The authors suggest that this may be because young people have more active lives and...

DURING THE pandemic, young people have often been accused of endangering their elders by flocking to beaches and returning prematurely to cafes, restaurants and bars. But younger folk are no more cavalier about the coronavirus than their older counterparts. In fact the evidence suggests that, if anything, it is old people who underestimate the risks posed by the virus.

In a new working paper, researchers from Harvard University, Bocconi University and the University of Oxford report the results of a survey in May of more than 1,500 Americans about the health risks posed by covid-19 for themselves and others. The preliminary results show that respondents aged 18-34 consider themselves to be nearly three times more likely to contract the disease than respondents over 70 do. On average, they reckon they have a 8.75% chance of catching it; over-70s put their own risk at only 3% (see chart). The authors suggest that this may be because young people have more active lives and...

DURING THE pandemic, young people have often been accused of endangering their elders by flocking to beaches and returning prematurely to cafes, restaurants and bars. But younger folk are no more cavalier about the coronavirus than their older counterparts. In fact the evidence suggests that, if anything, it is old people who underestimate the risks posed by the virus.

In a new working paper, researchers from Harvard University, Bocconi University and the University of Oxford report the results of a survey in May of more than 1,500 Americans about the health risks posed by covid-19 for themselves and others. The preliminary results show that respondents aged 18-34 consider themselves to be nearly three times more likely to contract the disease than respondents over 70 do. On average, they reckon they have a 8.75% chance of catching it; over-70s put their own risk at only 3% (see chart). The authors suggest that this may be because young people have more active lives and...