MUI

or, men's underwear index, on the premise that sales of such a private necessity reflects a measure of economic health. it makes sense. when you are poor, your boxers go a longer way.

this is clearly the summary index of our age:

1. in legitimizing public discourse over an intimate subject (we need to discuss the y-fronts, sir),

2. in marrying the clandestine with the fiscal (do you prefer the rhinestone studs, or the egyptian cotton, or just pvc?), and

3. in actually tracking such a subject (how many pairs per quarter, would you say?).

we could also have a WUI, to even things out, although that would need to be corrected for weight, ownership of mirrors, and romantic entanglements. we may have to convert it to the log index to allow meaningful comparison to the MUI.

postscript. HOM suggests an indelicate refinement to the MUI concept. don't just track sales, he says. track the number of days before laundering.