Generally reliable, the Rutland figures make a useful yardstick.

It will give you a useful yardstick against which you can measure whatever more extravagant suggestions you may encounter on the sales floor.

But if President Bush truly believes in his policies, perhaps he won't mind giving the American public a useful yardstick for grading their effectiveness.

Percy's ardour may ultimately have been unrequited, but it remains a useful yardstick.

Even if Advanced Placement were an effective high school education tool, there is little evidence to think it would be a useful yardstick for admissions.

These precursors could be useful yardsticks for measuring the American art that they brought their readers.

Certainly, well-made tests can be a useful yardstick, providing information that enables teachers to diagnose students' weaknesses.

The radius in which the ambulance can work serves as a useful yardstick for the security situation in the region.

This will also prove to be a useful yardstick by which we can measure the quality of our selection of candidates.

But other scientists said the balloon-gathered data were spotty and inconsistent as well, and did not provide a useful yardstick.