--- title: "Digits: Fireball, the IRS, T-Swift, and more news numbers - The Hustle" description: "Plus: Payment “sounds,” and the 1%." image: https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/hubfs/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/129374949-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-16T235545.801Z.webp --- # Digits: Fireball, the IRS, T-Swift, and more news numbers ![Jacob Cohen](https://thehustle.co/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/IMG_5670-1-modified-768x768.png?width=48&height=48&name=IMG_5670-1-modified-768x768.png) [Jacob Cohen](https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/author/jacob-cohen) [Jacob Cohen Twitter profile ](https://twitter.com/ImJacobCohen) Published: January 17, 2023 Updated: October 11, 2023 **1)** Payment companies pay lots of money for “signature sounds” that play when a purchase is made at a payment terminal. Interestingly, though, the majority of the time, the sound is turned off. Mastercard says its 1.3-second chime is played at [**300m touchpoints**](https://www.wsj.com/articles/sonic-logos-struggle-to-get-heard-at-u-s-checkouts-11673394395?mod=hp_minor_pos1) out of billions in use. ![Digits: Fireball, the IRS, T-Swift, and more news numbers](https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/hs-fs/hubfs/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/129374949-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-16T235545.801Z.webp?width=595&height=400&name=129374949-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-16T235545.801Z.webp) **2)** Another year, another Taylor Swift record — pun intended. Last year, Swift sold [**1.7m vinyl albums**](https://www.billboard.com/pro/taylor-swift-vinyl-albums-1-of-every-25-sold/), ~4% of the 43.5m vinyl albums sold in the US in 2022. Combined, Harry Styles and The Beatles — the next two top sellers, with 719k and 553k sales, respectively — did not surpass Swift. **3) **The IRS is still working through an enormous backlog of tax returns as this year’s tax season nears. The organization had [**4.7m unprocessed individual returns**](https://www.wsj.com/articles/irs-shrinks-tax-return-backlogs-as-next-filing-season-nears-11673449587?mod=lead_feature_below_a_pos1) and 3.2m business returns as of Dec. 31, 2021. Now it’s down to 400k individual returns and 1m business returns. **4) **Sazerac Company, the liquor maker behind the malt-based, Hot Tamales-esque Fireball Cinnamon, is apparently the 15th-largest beer vendor by convenience store sales, [**bringing in $70m+ in 2022**](https://vinepair.com/articles/fireball-top-50-beer-brand/). **5)** A new report from global-poverty charity Oxfam found that the world’s wealthiest 1% accumulated 63% of the [**$42T in new wealth **](https://www.cnbc.com/2023/01/16/richest-1percent-amassed-almost-two-thirds-of-new-wealth-created-since-2020-oxfam.html)created since 2020, with 99% of the global population amassing $16T of that wealth. 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Signup for a free account Close modal ```json { "@context" : "https://schema.org", "@type" : "BlogPosting", "author" : { "@type" : "Person", "name" : "Jacob Cohen", "url" : "https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/news/author/jacob-cohen" }, "datePublished" : "2023-01-17T08:08:33.000Z", "headline" : "Digits: Fireball, the IRS, T-Swift, and more news numbers", "image" : [ "https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/hubfs/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/129374949-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-16T235545.801Z.webp" ], "mainEntityOfPage" : { "@id" : "https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/news/01172023-digits", "@type" : "WebPage" }, "publisher" : { "@type" : "Organization", "logo" : { "@type" : "ImageObject" } } } ``` ```json { "@context" : "https://schema.org", "@id" : "#article", "@type" : "NewsArticle", "author" : { "@type" : "Person", "name" : "Jacob Cohen", "url" : "https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/author/jacob-cohen" }, "dateModified" : "2023-10-11T19:36:56+0000", "datePublished" : "2023-01-17T08:08:33+0000", "headline" : "Digits: Fireball, the IRS, T-Swift, and more news numbers", "image" : [ "https://7355427.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hubfs/7355427/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/129374949-HS-News-Brief_2023-01-16T235545.801Z.webp" ], "publisher" : { "@type" : "Organization", "logo" : { "@type" : "ImageObject", "height" : 112, "url" : "https://fs.hubspotusercontent00.net/hubfs/53/assets/hubspot.com/web-team/WBZ/Blog%202021/Images/Logos/HubSpot%20Logo%20112X112.svg", "width" : 112 }, "name" : "HubSpot", "sameAs" : [ "https://www.facebook.com/hubspot", "https://twitter.com/hubspot" ], "url" : "https://www.hubspot.com" }, "speakable" : { "@type" : "SpeakableSpecification", "xPath" : [ "//title", "/html/head/meta[@name='description']/@content" ] } } ```