Projects
Graphics by Nathan Yau, borne out of everyday curiosities, learning experiments, and mild insomnia.
For Everyone Else
In a Channel 4 clip, Hugh Montgomery does some back-of-the-napkin math contrasting the normal flu against the coronavirus. Here's a chart version.
Guessing Names Based on What They Start With
I'm terrible at names, but maybe data can help. Put in your sex, the decade when you were born, and start putting in your name. I'll try to guess before you're done.
Best Directors Who Were Not White Men
From 1928, the year of the first Academy Awards, to 2019, there have been 455 nominations for Best Director. Of those, 18 of them went to non-white men.
Occupation Growth and Decline
We looked at shifts in job distribution over the past several decades, but it was difficult to see by how much each occupation group changed individually. This chart makes the changes more obvious.
Shifts in Job Distribution
In the 1950s, almost half of all employed people were either in farming or manufacturing. As you can imagine, work changed a bit over the years.
All the Foreign Bodies That Got Stuck
Many things get stuck in people's bodies. This is the percentage breakdown for the most common objects that end up in the emergency room.
Salary and Occupation
Salaries vary across occupations. Here are some charts that show by how much for 800 of them.
How Much You Should Be Saving for Retirement
There are a lot of variables to consider, but for people of middle income, here's a suggestion, based on when you start saving and when you want to retire.
Saving for Retirement and Age
People tend to have more money saved up over time, but range and variation also grow, and often it’s not enough.
When Americans Reach $100k in Savings
It was reported that 1 in 6 millennials have at least $100,000 saved. Is this right? It seems high. I looked at the data to find out and then at all of the age groups.
Mapping When and Where People Start their Commute
For commuters, the farther away you live from the workplace, the earlier you have to leave your house to get to work on time. How much does that start time change the farther out you get?
How Much Commuting is Too Much?
One person's long commute is another's dream. Another person's normal might be someone else's nightmare. What counts as a long commute depends on where you live.
Sleep Schedule, From the Inconsistent Teenage Years to Retirement
From the teenage years to college to adulthood through retirement, sleep is all over the place at first but then converges towards consistency.
Restless Sleep With Age
It seems like no matter what I do, I cannot sleep through the night. Will it ever let up? According to the data, the answer is no and it will only get worse.
The Most Gender-Switched Names in US History
We use some names mostly for boys and some mostly for girls, but then there is a small percentage that, over time, switched from one gender to another. Which names made the biggest switch?
