Showing posts with label chartporn. Show all posts
October 27, 2010
Poverty in America - A Visualization
20/20
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ABC
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Appalachia
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chartporn
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Diane Sawyer
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huffington post
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map
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poor
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poverty
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I first saw the visualization below on the Chart Porn blog, which linked to the original article on The Huffington Post. This is an excellent visualization that effectively uses colors to emphasizes the highest poverty rates and provides information in a user-friendly format when you mouse over the map. The only thing I wish it would do is allow you to click on a state and drill down into the county-level data.
Immediately popping out to me are the poverty rates around the lower Mississippi River and Eastern Kentucky/Central Appalachia regions. A quick Google search turned up a documentary by Diane Sawyer that aired on ABC's 20/20 in February 2009.
From The Huffington Post:
Roll over each state to see its poverty rate.
Immediately popping out to me are the poverty rates around the lower Mississippi River and Eastern Kentucky/Central Appalachia regions. A quick Google search turned up a documentary by Diane Sawyer that aired on ABC's 20/20 in February 2009.
- The oldest mountains in America are rich in natural beauty with their raging creeks, steep hollows and old pines. They are also one of the poorest, most disadvantaged regions in America. Central Appalachia has up to three times the national poverty rate, an epidemic of prescription drug abuse, the shortest life span in the nation, toothlessness, cancer and chronic depression.
From The Huffington Post:
- In 2009, poverty among Americans reached its highest level in 51 years. The states hardest hit include Louisiana, Mississippi and District of Columbia. States with the lowest poverty statistics include, Wyoming, Hawaii, New Jersey and Minnesota.
Roll over each state to see its poverty rate.
July 6, 2010
Easy to see fireworks
ChartPorn has once again provided a visualization that is worth improving. The mess created this time is caused by the website Bad Firecracker.
Here are the charts to be critiqued:
I have a couple of big issues with these bar charts:
Here are the charts to be critiqued:
I have a couple of big issues with these bar charts:
- The grid lines are dark, distracting, horizontal, vertical, and overall incredibly distracting. I think the purpose of the charts is to show a trend, but with all of these grid lines, how are you supposed to see the trend?
- The data labels are unnecessary. Again, if you're trying to show an overall trend, the focus needs to be on the trend, not each individual point.
- Each chart has a color legend out to the right and it refers to the vertical axis. Why not properly label the axis in the first place? The color isn't needed unless you're showing all of the charts together in one dashboard.
Here's how I would do it:
- Show all of the data together so that comparisons can be made.
- Since all of the data is on one chart, use colors to differentiate the measures.
- For the purpose of comparing their charts to mine, I created bar charts. What you will notice though is that there are no distracting grid lines and no data labels.
- The axis titles clearly indicate what data is displayed
- Only show the year once, at the bottom of the chart.
- A data table is at the bottom so that if someone is interested in knowing the exact number, they can quickly look it up. This allows the data labels to be removed from the chart.
Surely you see that I have line charts to the right of the bar charts. I prefer the line charts to the bar charts because they're easier to read and the data-to-ink ratio is low.
Follow these simple principles as you create your charts. Your readers will thank you. Keep it simple.
July 2, 2010
Implicit Comparison
The July 1st ChartPorn daily blog post linked to an interesting interactive graphic for economic indicators from the Wall Street Journal, which the author calls "Danger Signs."
The first graph that appears is called Summer Chills. There are two graphs, one for consumer confidence and one for yield on the 10-yr treasury. When I first looked at this, my impression was that the two charts were related. If you carefully read the caption, you can see that they aren't.
I see some issues between the graphs:
The first graph that appears is called Summer Chills. There are two graphs, one for consumer confidence and one for yield on the 10-yr treasury. When I first looked at this, my impression was that the two charts were related. If you carefully read the caption, you can see that they aren't.
I see some issues between the graphs:
- The time frames are different. The CCI graph goes from 2007 through June 2010 and it's by month. However, the 10-yr treasury yield is for the current year and it's by day.
- The scale on the 10-yr treasury yield graph is not zero-based, which leads to variances between points that are greater than the relative variance.
- The reference bands are a bit distracting.
- The level of precision on the mark on the 10-yr treasury yield graph is not necessary. Go with two decimals since that's how it's typically reported.
Some things I like:
- Highlighting the current period and adding a data label
- Chart headers are clear
- Fonts used
- Line colors stand out, grabbing your attention
Here's how I would represent the data:
The improvements I have made (for each problem noted above):
The improvements I have made (for each problem noted above):
- The time frames are now consistent; they start at January 2007 and go through June 2010. They also are by month only.
- The scale on the 10-yr treasury yield graph is now zero-based.
- The reference bands have been muted and I've started them at the 2nd range, not at the bottom.
- The line for each measure is a different coloring, triggering you to notice they are distinct.
- Finally, I added a dual-axis line chart that shows the relationship between the measures.
While the point the author is trying to represent is valid, properly created graphs are essential to tell the true story.
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