If the guys in operations could see a stack of Buy Large IBM interests from multiple brokers and very few Sells, then they could, with fair accuracy, tell which way the stock as going to turn at the open.

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Many of the people that will contribute to it have already been born, so short of some catastrophe that kills off large numbers of people, or some Viagra-fuelled leap in birth rates, population numbers and age composition can be predicted with fair accuracy for decades ahead.

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As the railway lines have been upgraded over the years, the price differences between rural and London housing have shrunk and as that example shows, you can actually calculate the price difference to a fair degree of accuracy.

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The NUS president, who has always championed partnership working in the past, said there would be a "desperate need" for a new universities' "watchdog", with powers to refer university pricing practices to the Office for Fair Trading or the Monopolies Commission and to monitor the accuracy of prospectuses.

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