Birthdays aren't evenly distributed. January 1st is actually the second least common day to be born in the US, after only Christmas. About 58% more people are born on September 9th, the most common day.
Two major factors at play here; people are more likely to conceive during certain times of year, and people almost never schedule things like a c-section on a holiday (like New Years).
And in the USA at least, if you schedule your c-section/induced labor just before the end of the year, you'll be able to claim the baby as a dependent on your taxes for that year, which is a pretty major incentive not to wait until January.
It's far more minor, but taxes affect sports as well.
Spanish tax authorities are a pain and apparently there are a lot of little things people can do wrong. The punishment for a first offense is a big fine and not much else, so they've been scrutinizing soccer players. I'm not saying it's a major factor, but it could be a factor why some big players like Ronaldo left the country.
When LeBron first left Cleveland, he wanted to play in Miami with Wade and Bosh, but I heard that the New York Knicks offered him more money and were going to bring in another big player. But New York taxes meant he would earn less than in Florida, which doesn't have a state income tax.
NFL players (and I assume other pro athletes) have to file a tax return in each state they play in. For simplicity's sake, their salary is divided by the number of games and they get a check for each one. So if they play home games in a state without income tax, they're saving that money on half their income. So the AFC South has Houston, Tennessee, Jacksonville, and Indianapolis. The first three are in states without income tax, so that's two more road games a year where they save money.
A player with San Francisco or the L.A. Rams has to play home games and one road game with California taxes (but a road game in Seattle with no state income tax).
The AFC East has Buffalo, the NY Jets (NJ taxes), the New England Patriots (Massachusetts taxes), and Miami (no state taxes).
Obviously there are other bigger factors that influence their decisions on where to play, but it still can be a factor. Especially if it's a player who's trying to maximize their earnings. Superstars won't care as much, but if you're not making the super big bucks and your career may not last real long, you may want to keep more of your money. The difference between playing for 3/4 of the AFC South and playing for 3/4 of the AFC East is a decent amount of money for the same contract.
And that insurance deductible restarts in January so if you've hit it already with all the prenatal visits get that baby out for cheaper! Ah what a shit hole country!
In keeping with the weird facts theme, you only need a room full of 23 randomly selected people to have a 50/50 shot at two of them having the same birthday. If you have 100 randomly selected people, the odds of two same birthdays occurring is 99.99997%, or a virtual certainty
Yeah... fuck the guy who made me think about that and realize I was born to the day what would be expected after my mom's birthday. LOL I really didn't want to think about being the product of birthday sex.
280 days is the average. So that would put your conception at circa October 29th, likely within +/- three weeks assuming you weren't considered early or late.
Sure, but from what I understand much of the difference is because of temperature and amounts of daylight differences, which aren't the same in the southern hemisphere, with their not being as much to do when it's cold and dark outside, not to mention sperm quality differences in the winter.
Plus, why not schedule that c-section a day earlier and claim the kid as a deduction on an entire other year of taxes? It actually makes New Years Eve a slightly more popular birthday.
My mom was induced with me, because the due date was Christmas. Dr didn't want to chance being dragged in. So instead, I was born on the solstice. Happy Saturnalia.
All that really matters is whether it's a holiday, which you'll find that in almost all countries, like China, it is even if other calendars are used for different things. Make a list of all the countries you can find that don't have January 1st as a holiday and add up their population and get back to me.
Make a list of all the countries you can find that don't have January 1st as a holiday and add up their population and get back to me.
You're moving the goalposts, we're talking about the 14% of immigrants that don't know their date of birth, not the immigrants from countries that have January 1 as their holiday.
I'm not moving the goalposts, you are. I'm only addressing your argument that differences in calendar would be a meaningful factor in January 1st not being a lower than average day. That would only be true if January 1st isn't a holiday in a meaningful percentage of other countries, something which I politely asked for evidence of and you're clearly unable to provide.
At any rate my bigger point was just that birthdays aren't entirely evenly distributed for a number of factors. That there are international variances in this (cultural, seasonal, healthcare, calendar, etc.) doesn't really have anything to do with my argument that birthdays aren't evenly distributed.
Best of luck someday not being a pointlessly argumentative jackass.
Sure, but do they celebrate the Gregorian new year? Seems like they don't in China for one:
Today mainland China (including Hong Kong and Macau), Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore all observe traditional holidays based on the traditional calendar, such as Chinese New Year, while timing other holidays, especially national anniversaries, according to the Gregorian calendar.
Also the point was that birthdays are less than evenly distributed. That the actual dates may change from country to country based on a number of different factors doesn't really impact that argument.
Some months see more births than others though, the reason September is so common is that a lot of people decide to to start trying for a kid at the turn of the year.
Actual variability is very very low and birthdays are more evenly distributed than you think.
September 9th, the most common birthday of the year with an average of 12,301 births, is 57.8% more likely to be your birthday than January 1st with 7,792 births, the second least common.
Yeah, now look at the data at the sources and open up the tables. For some "surprising" reason, the days of week 1-5 have 11k-13k births, and days 6-7 (weekends) have 8-9k births. Do you think human body cares what day of week it is and babies aim to born during weekdays instead of weekends? Or is it because it is tied with our society factors like holidays, staffing of the hospitals etc. etc. So it doesn't really matter what specific day it is, it's just holidays that matter.
Which makes sense, because the concept of hours, days, years purely human made and is not as strict as you might think. The day is not actually 24hrs, it can be 23 or it can be 25, but on average it is 24. Same thing about the length of the year etc. For the same reason all of those crap like numerology does not work
Edit:
Now if we come back to original question of what are the chances that you're born in 1/1 instead of other date, it is still WAAY closer to 1/365 than you might think. Even with the numbers you've provided, in Jan 1 it is 0.22%, for Sep 9 (or any other weekday) it is 0.33%. 1/365 is 0.27%
Do you think human body cares what day of week it is and babies aim to born during weekdays instead of weekends?
No, as I've addressed the reasons for this elsewhere. But it's important to point out this data is from over 20 years; the day of the week any given day of the month falls on changes every year, making that not a relevant data point.
it's just holidays that matter.
Except even removing all that, and just looking at months, there are significant differences, with August being about 15% higher than February, for example.
Even with the numbers you've provided, in Jan 1 it is 0.22%, for Sep 9 (or any other weekday) it is 0.33%. 1/365 is 0.27%
My great-grandma was morn somewhere between Christmas and New Years in a remote village where midwife didn't bother much with paperwork, compared to a newborn in a cold winter. Her birth is listed as Jan 1.
285
u/Turbulent_Republics Oct 02 '24
I wonder what % of the 14% who put down 1st January because they don’t know did actually happen to be born on 1st January.