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Big picture question: How do I calculate the weight to give certain categories?

Specifics: I have data for 70 counties, population in each county, and then number of sales in each county. How do I create the weighted value for each county? To give small population counties and large population counties equal amounts of weight.

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  • $\begingroup$ Why would you want to give equal weight to counties with unequal populations? $\endgroup$ – Peter Flom May 9 '18 at 10:50
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Divide the sales value of each country by its population. You get average sales by person, which is not elegant. To get nicer result multiply the result with a large constant (e.g. 100 000) to get standardized sales by 100 000 people.

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  • $\begingroup$ I need to give the populations equal weights though. Dividing sales by population would give each county its weighted value, but I need to give each county the same weighted value. Basically so that smaller counties are given more weight, while larger counties are given less weight. $\endgroup$ – BrianBeing May 9 '18 at 8:08
  • $\begingroup$ The above-mentioned solution provides with the values of sales as if each country has the same population. It is not your aim? $\endgroup$ – Daniel Dostal May 9 '18 at 8:12
  • $\begingroup$ Do you mean divide the sales in each county by the total population of all counties added up? $\endgroup$ – BrianBeing May 9 '18 at 8:50
  • $\begingroup$ No, divide the sales of country A by population of country A. You get the sales by average person in country A. Then do the same with country B. $\endgroup$ – Daniel Dostal May 9 '18 at 8:54

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