You Cannot Stop Single Ladies, You Can Only Hope To Contain It

All the single ladies. All the single ladies. All the single ladies. All the single ladies. All the single ladies. All the single ladies. All the single ladies whoa-oh-oh. Whoa-oh-oh.

These words, and their accompanying music, have become, irrevocably, a part of our lives. That beat. That inescapably catchy melody and beat and, um, everything. You can't escape it: Beyonce's Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It) is the song of the year, if not our time.

How did it so quickly achieve iconic status? Well, it's catchy. It contains one of those simple, perfect lyrics that come along only once in awhile. Look at You Are So Beautiful and I Want To Hold Your Hand: its the simple ones that are the most enduring... and the toughest to create.

It also has an insanely repetitive refrain. We are bombarded with the words "All the single ladies..." over and over... and over... and over.

Good for sales, then. But bad for... the economy?

Yes (gulp), according to Phil Maymin, professor of finance and risk engineering at NYU. Maymin studied a decades-long test period of Billboard Hot 100 charts and found, bizarrely, that the less beat variance a song had, that is the more steady, unchanging backbeat a tune possessed, the more volatile the stock market was. So the more straightforward the music, the crazier the market. And it's definitely the songs that have the driving influence; the music correctly, according to this theory, anticipates the market.

Which brings us back to Single Ladies, Beyonce's Number 1 hit. It, of course, has a pretty regular beat, which just keeps going, and going. Not good for the market. But then again, nothing is these days. And this week, Single Ladies actually fell to Number 2. The new Number 1? Lady GaGa's Just Dance. And what is the nature of its beat, you ask? Pretty straightforward. So keep that money in your mattress.

And would we ever be remiss if we didn't point your attention to the below clip (found via Andrew Sullivan) of a cute-as-a-button lil' girl dancing along to Single Ladies. They grow up so fast.