COLUMNISTS At the time Elvis Presley died in 1977, he had 150 impersonators in the US. Now, according to calculations I spotted in a Sunday newspaper colour supplement recently, there are 85,000. Intriguingly, that means one in every 3,400 Americans is an Elvis impersonator. More disturbingly, if Elvis impersonators continue multiplying at the same rate, they will account for a third of the world’s population by 2019.
Trends can be worrying things. If obesity continues rising at its present rate, today’s children will be the first in recent times to die younger than their parents. If road traffic keeps growing at its present rate, it will eventually become necessary to coat the entire planet in asphalt. If prison populations keep growing at their present rate, we will all end up in jail.
