3 ms·

I believe this is a New Yorker magazine house style thing. I'd assume the author uses numerals in the book this article is based on.

• HPsquared 1y ago
  If there are two options, you can trust they'll go for the more verbose one.
  • shmeeed 1y ago
    Autors are often paid by word count. Note that I'm not saying that's the reason here, but it could be.