Furthermore, statistical estimates suggest that as much as 90% of the reason that women have families of a particular size is simply because that is the number of children they want.

ECONOMIST: Population control

In order for his statistical estimates to be valid, he has to assume that a poor couple which decides to have a child needs the same proportionate increase in spending to maintain its living standard as a rich couple.

ECONOMIST: The war over poverty

The county vote is put into statistical models and estimates and projections are made.

CNN: How does CNN make election projections?

The EU's statistical agency Eurostat estimates that from 2011 to 2012, CO2 emissions increased by 3.9% in the UK. The rise is most likely to be due to increased coal burning.

BBC: Cheap coal 'threatens UK pollution targets'

Based on this correlation, the economists built a statistical model that provided estimates of GDP levels for regions and countries without reliable economic data based solely on the satellite images.

FORBES: The Case for Keeping the Lights On

Otis Brawley, an epidemiologist and breast-cancer specialist who heads the American Cancer Society, notes such estimates are all statistical presumptions.

WSJ: Can Breast Cancer Be Overtreated?

The county or town vote is put into statistical models, and Edison makes estimates and projections using those models.

CNN: How does CNN make election projections?

Academic estimates are that these statistical biases of self-selection (reporting is optional for the largely unregulated hedge fund industry) add 3-5 percentage points to index returns.

FORBES: Chasing the Mirage of Hedge Fund Returns