Recent 10
Post: Quincy 2009 Election: The Levy Limit
Photo: February Snowstorm
Post: Quincy 2009 Election: Tale of Two Taxes
Photo: Sailors' Home Cemetery, Quincy
Photo: Yawkee Way Banners
Photo: Paris Las Vegas
Photo: John Adams Coin Celebration
Photo: Spearhead, American Museum of Natural History, NY
Photo: U.S. Mint Director Moy Unveils John Adams Coin
Random 5
Photo: Ette at T.T. the Bear's Place
Post: Lying with Data
Photo: Go Board Top View, Basic Opening
Photo: Jellyfish of Moterey Bay
Photo: Ette at T.T. the Bear's Place

Lying with Data, featuring Nancy Pelosi

On Feb 6th, the following was posted on Speaker Nancy Pelosi's speaker.gov. The below chart, showing absolute numbers of non-farm job losses (seasonally adjusted)1 in a couple of U.S. recessions:

Pelosi's job loss chart

This contains a couple of classic ways to lie with data:

  1. Cherry picking data series: A curious omission is the recession of the early 80's, which has a job loss curve very similar to the current situation. I guess when data do not support your fear-mongering, you can just leave them out?
  2. Scaling issues: This chart shows absolute numbers of jobs lost, not as a percentage of peak jobs. The 1990 recession looks tame, but there were about 30 million fewer jobs to be lost in the 1990's. Was the recession smaller just because the country and economy were?

Once you add in the early 1980's recession and make the vertical axis percentage change from the peak number of jobs, it looks like this (notice the similarity between the current and 1981 series):

Corrected job loss chart

The Speaker's blog says "This chart compares the job loss so far in this recession to job losses in the 1990-1991 recession and the 2001 recession. showing how dramatic and unprecedented the job loss over the last 13 months has been." I say that their presentation deliberately misrepresents the situation, which is ironic considering their next post: "Critics Continue To Push Misleading Information About Economic Recovery Plan.".

Using the public's panic to push one's own agenda is predatory and disgusting. The idea that the severity of the crisis precludes any debate over what we should do, that we should just shut up and follow the party in power's lead, pervades Democratic talking points. If you replace "recession" with "terror," it all sounds an awful lot like Republican talking points from the Bush era. I am getting very sick of being told that criticism and debate are against the best interests of my country. Commenter Eclectro at Boing Boing, I think, said it best by quoting FDR:

"So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself -- nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance."

1 Not that the post tells you this, I'm just guessing based on the shape of their graph.

Comments? E-mail me at: "me" at this domain (adammarquis.com). Home