Results tagged “information”

Ezra Klein over at the Washington Post has compiled a slideshow of charts made by economists that illustrate the economic woes facing the country. These charts are ugly as hell, from a strictly aesthetic standpoint, but they are beautiful in the concise way they present information. Unfortunately, the content of the information is quite frightening. Below is a selection from the original posting.

This chart illustrates the changing nature of work for men in the United States. As women continue to enter and equalize the workforce, competition for jobs becomes stiffer. In addition, men have been steadily performing worse in schools and colleges for decades, leaving many ill-prepared and ill-trained for steady employment.

The author of this chart put in a little gallows humor to emphasize the growing disparity between corporate profits and compensation to those that generate the profits. This is a powerful chart in that it brings to mind a fundamental flaw in our economy. As it now operates, the American economy is a powerful engine of revenue creation, but not job creation. In fact, in many instances, obliterating jobs can generate more profits than adding jobs. This is an economy caught in the throes of entropy, and a question must be asked: What is the point of economic growth if the majority of Americans see no benefit from said growth, or even find themselves slipping backwards?

Finally, this chart has a great title. "The Toil Index." This shows the ever-increasing amount of hours an American has to work in a month to be able to afford rent. From just over 40 hours a month in 1950 to over a hundred this past decade, it's heartbreaking to see just how much of our labor goes to an essential need of human existence. The reality of our economy is that we are still far better off than our ancestors, but the promise of a better life has taken a huge hit.

So, these charts are ugly, beautiful, frightening, and fascinating.

NYTimes: Designers Make Data Much Easier to Digest

In an uncharted world of boundless data, information designers are our new navigators.

In a Stamen graphic of Twitter traffic during an MTV awards show, the number of tweets about celebrities was reflected in the size of their photos. They are computer scientists, statisticians, graphic designers, producers and cartographers who map entire oceans of data and turn them into innovative visual displays, like rich graphs and charts, that help both companies and consumers cut through the clutter. These gurus of visual analytics are making interactive data synonymous with attractive data.

And:

Visual analytics play off the idea that the brain is more attracted to and able to process dynamic images than long lists of numbers. But the goal of information visualization is not simply to represent millions of bits of data as illustrations. It is to prompt visceral comprehension, moments of insight that make viewers want to learn more.

Bingo. It's great to see what we designers do get recognized by the mainstream press.