RJ's Inspiration #020 🗂

RJ's Inspiration

weekly viz to inspire you too

🗂 REGULARITY OF EMPLOYMENT
is one of dozens of colorful charts in A Graphic Analysis of the Census of Manufactures: 1849 to 1919, published by the National Industrial Conference Board in 1923. It compares the "Per cent of average fluctuations in employment, by states" between 1914 (blue) and 1919 (yellow). See the full chart, and the rest of the book, at Hathi Trust.

This is a masterfully designed chart. The use of fills and outlines to create the comparison is perfect: it is efficient, you can see the difference, there is no confusion (like so many stacked area charts) that each bar extends all the way to the baseline. Exhaustive annotation gives all the numbers, if you want them. Everything is ordered in a way that makes sense, by 1919 rank, a reference foundation that is clearly labeled.

Thanks goes to Jason Forrest (Twitter) for calling this wonderful volume to my attention.

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Please reply directly to share your favorite viz, offer any advice for how this newsletter experiment can be improved, or say hello. -RJ