Question

Lobbying Congress. In the special report, "Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us" (TIME, Vol. 181, No. 8, 2013), S. Brill presented an in-depth investigation of hospital billing practices that reveals why U.S. health care spending is out of control. One of the many statistics provided in the report is that, during the period from 1998 through 2012, the pharmaceutical and health-care-products industries and organizations representing doctors, hospitals, nursing homes, health services, and HMOs spent \(5.36 billion lobbying Congress.

(a). Under what conditions would the \)5.36 billion lobbying-expenditure figure be a descriptive statistic? Explain your answer.

(b). Under what conditions would the $5.36 billion lobbying- expenditure figure be an inferential statistic? Explain your answer.

Short answer

Part (a) If the result is produced based on all lobbying expenditures then it will represent a descriptive statistic.

Part (b) If the estimated result is based on a sample of lobbying expenditures then it will represent an inferential statistic.

Step-by-step solution

Step 1. Given information.

The given investigation is:

In the special report, "Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us", S. Brill presented an in-depth investigation of hospital billing practices that reveals why U.S. health care spending is out of control. One of the many statistics provided in the report is that, during the period from 1998 through 2012, the pharmaceutical and health-care-products industries and organizations representing doctors, hospitals, nursing homes, health services, and HMOs spent $5.36 billion lobbying Congress.

Part (a) Step 2. Explain under what conditions would the $5.36 billion lobbying-expenditure figure be a descriptive statistic.

Descriptive statistics are those that represent information that has been summarised and structured.

If the result is produced based on all lobbying expenditures made by the pharmaceutical and health-care-products industry and groups from 1998 to 2012, the condition that $5.36 billion lobbying Congress will represent descriptive data.

Part (b) Step 1. Explain under what conditions would the $5.36 billion lobbying- expenditure figure be an inferential statistic.

We know that Inferential statistics are statistics that are used to draw conclusions about a population based on a sample of that population.

If the estimated result is based on a sample of lobbying expenditures made by the pharmaceutical and health-care-products industry and groups from 1998 to 2012, the condition that $5.36 billion lobbying Congress will represent the inferential statistics.