Average salary

[ThomasSoerensen]

Your 1st post on this thread still doesn't tell us which average is used in your German figures.

Its an important point without which the whole thread is meaningless.

Better to be an ass than talk crap without even knowing it

I think it is safe to assume that if a newspaper writes "average" then they mean the arithmetic mean.

So with a bit of common sense the who thread is not meaningless.

[Mich the Tester]

So with a bit of common sense the who thread is not meaningless.

With a bit of common sense you'd account for CUK being full of pedants, inadequates and social misfits.

[ThomasSoerensen]

To me the word "average" always means mean.

I see Wikipedia defines "average" in the way that the majority here have stated, and I recently became aware (to my surprise) that the UK school statistics syllabus also uses that terminology, so I will allow that that is the correct definition.

However, in that case, the word is of no use as a technical term except to those studying statistics at a very rudimentary level. Those boasting of their knowledge of this definition appear slightly ridiculous to me, since a word with such a loose meaning has no place in any conversation precise enough to mention numbers.

I can't think of any context in which it would be acceptable to say the "average" is X (a number) where by average one meant the median. In an informal context (i.e. outside of an academic paper) one might use the term "average" to denote the mean, but one would never use it to denote the median.

I challenge all those who've pompously (if correctly) asserted that the mean is a type of average to find an example of a statistically literate person describing a number which is a median as an "average." (Educational materials covering introductory statistics don't count.) (Actually this is a trick challenge; apart from being impossible to prove (how do we know the number is a median if they don't say so?) there's also the issue that if they do do it I will respond that that by definition disqualifies them from being called statistically literate.)

(I should mention that I studied statistics for two years at university, and I'm pretty sure we were taught that "average" = "mean". It was a long time ago though, so maybe I've forgotten. As far as I can recall, the median and the mode weren't mentioned much as concepts after the first week of the first year, so the issue of what "average" meant wouldn't have been in focus for more than one lecture. Possibly we always used more precise terminology, so the issue never came up.)

I agree with you on all this. This is how I see the world too. Average=mean, median=median for normal people. Except most normal people have no idea median exists. Or they have forgotten it 10 minutes after they handed in the last math exam paper.

[sasguru]

With a bit of common sense you'd account for CUK being full of pedants, inadequates and social misfits.

Yes but is that on average, the median state or the mode?

[Mich the Tester]

Yes but is that on average, the median state or the mode?

mode

[ThomasSoerensen]

With a bit of common sense you'd account for CUK being full of pedants, inadequates and social misfits.

Too true for comfort.

I apologise to the CUK community for having ever assumed they possess common sense. I am sorry!
Not really

[sasguru]

Indeed and also accounts for the rather old fashioned word "modish" to describe the fashionable.

Anyway getting back on track to the conversation in hand, 1500 Euros per month is indeed a very low amount to live on.
Which Is why I suspected it was a median.
The mean is always dragged to the "right" by the relatively few multimillionaires in any country,

[RichardCranium]

To me the word "average" always means mean.

(I should mention that I studied statistics for two years at university, and I'm pretty sure we were taught that "average" = "mean". It was a long time ago though, so maybe I've forgotten. As far as I can recall, the median and the mode weren't mentioned much as concepts after the first week of the first year, so the issue of what "average" meant wouldn't have been in focus for more than one lecture. Possibly we always used more precise terminology, so the issue never came up.)

If I could find a suitable picture of some huge hairy bollocks, I'd post that instead of replying.

Evidently my GCE O Level Mathematics was a damn site more thorough than your degree.

Using the mean average as the only average is inappropriate in many cases - salaries is an excellent example.

[sasguru]

This paints a more detailed picture:

Germany Average Salary Income - Job Comparison

[sasguru]

If I could find a suitable picture of some huge hairy bollocks, I'd post that instead of replying.

Evidently my GCE O Level Mathematics was a damn site more thorough than your degree.

Using the mean average as the only average is inappropriate in many cases - salaries is an excellent example.

I suspect IR35 avoider had a Labour educashun.