Check out these data visualizations from Mother Jones. Well designed to promote the splenetic humors.

A Harvard business prof and a behavioral economist recently asked more than 5,000 Americans how they thought wealth is distributed in the United States. Most thought that it’s more balanced than it actually is. Asked to choose their ideal distribution of wealth, 92% picked one that was even more equitable.

A huge share of the nation's economic growth over the past 30 years has gone to the top one-hundredth of one percent, who now make an average of $27 million per household. The average income for the bottom 90 percent of us? $31,244.

An excerpt from the chart.

TLDR: Should you work for free? No, unless it is for your Mom.

There is no explanation of the analysis, so it's difficult to understand the distribution. But I like the presentation, nonetheless.

This is great.

I quote:

One of the major themes for 2010 was using data not just for analysis or business intelligence, but for telling stories. People are starting to make use of the data (especially government-related) that was released in 2009, and there was a lot more data made available this year (with plenty more to come).

A couple of my favorites.

Driving Shifts Into Reverse

Hannah Fairfield, former editor for The New York Times, and now graphics director for The Washington Post, had a look at gas prices versus miles driven per capita. The chart could've easily been an x-y scatterplot, but the extra step was taken to connect the dots so to speak. Points were ordered by time, and turns were clearly explained graphically.

The Evolution of Privacy on Facebook

This weekender by Matt McKeon of the IBM Visual Communication Lab explored the changes of Facebook privacy policies over the years. It came right after Facebook had made another update to push for a more public profile. Click on the interactive, and see what becomes public and how many people can see your postings.

Good stuff! Check out the rest here.

The Patchwork Nation site uses infographics to describe 12 different community types: demographic trends that go beyond mere party affiliation.

I spent more than a few minutes looking at all of the cities I've lived in and checking in on how they are faring in the current recession.

I could use a bit more data that the site provides, actually. I like the articles that connect current events (like foreclosures and the election) to the community types, but there aren't enough of them. However, the site does a good job of supporting the premise of the book.

A hat tip goes to Jacqueline for the link.

The top 100 web brands, by COLORLovers.

Compare to AMO/ WIRED's 2003 graphic of the top 100 brands overall. Here, again, blue dominates.

Each dot represents where 25 people of the same race live. Caucasians are shown in red; African Americans, blue; Hispanics, orange; and Asians, green.

New York City

Detroit, Michigan