The FREAKest Links: Polite Americans and Spend-Happy Teens Edition

From Reuters, via the New Zealand Herald: Contrary to the notion that American tourists are obnoxious, a survey of 15,000 European hoteliers found that Americans ranked second, behind the Japanese, as the world’s politest and most preferable guests. This may have to do, of course, with our great fondness for tipping. Britons, meanwhile, were rated the fifth worst tourists, due to “rude behavior, noise and a miserly attitude to tipping.”

More than a dozen Washington Post staffers spent a Saturday tailing sixty teenage girls (and one boy) through Tysons Corner, a shopping mecca for affluent Washingtonians. The reporters studied how teens make buying decisions by following them around the mall and documenting their purchases in print, photos, audio clips and video.

Via Consumerist: Forbes has published a list of the best- and worst-paying jobs in the U.S. The top nine slots are all types of doctors; the bottom six all involve the restaurant business. The No. 1 job is anesthesiologist. What does it say about us that the best-paying job in America involves bringing someone to the brink of death?