US mobile phone subscriptions per 100 people

Over twenty-one years, as Americans acquired mobile phones at a rate that eventually exceeded one subscription per person, the air they were breathing to make their calls measurably improved. The correlation is 0.974, which is the kind of number that makes epidemiologists either very excited or very suspicious, depending on their disposition. The obvious implication is that 5G towers are functioning as enormous air purifiers, though the telecom industry has been oddly reluctant to market this.

US mobile phone subscriptions per 100 people rose from roughly 50 in 2002 to over 120 by 2022, tracking the full arc of the smartphone era. Over the same period, EPA data shows a genuine and documented improvement in air quality across US counties, driven by Clean Air Act enforcement, the shift away from coal power, and the decline of heavy manufacturing in many regions. Both trends follow a smooth, technology-and-policy-driven upward curve across two decades, which is precisely why they correlate so well — they are both measuring the passage of time in an era of simultaneous technological adoption and environmental regulation. The mobile phone is simply a very precise clock.

Two good things improving simultaneously is not evidence that one caused the other — it may only be evidence that the period in question was, on balance, a decent one. Coincidence is often just the fingerprint of an era.