Data Vis Dispatch,
January 4

The best of last week’s big and small data visualizations

Welcome back to the 27th edition of Data Vis Dispatch! Every week, we’ll be publishing a collection of the best small and large data visualizations we find, especially from news organizations — to celebrate data journalism, data visualization, simple charts, elaborate maps, and their creators.

Recurring topics this week include land use, violent political rhetoric, and 2021 in review.

It’s 2022! Several newsrooms gave us a final, bird’s-eye view of the past year — and the Economist even offered a look forward at the one to come. (For more of the data vis year in review, be sure to check out Maarten Lambrechts’ list of 2021 visualization lists.)

The Economist: What prediction markets suggest will happen in 2022, January 1
Axios: The relentless 2021 news cycle in one chart, December 30
The Wall Street Journal: IPOs Had a Record 2021. Now They Are Selling Off Like Crazy, December 29
The Guardian: Two years of coronavirus: how pandemic unfolded around the world, December 31

Unfortunately, we haven’t left the pandemic behind in 2021:

Financial Times: Global Omicron surge drives cases to record highs in 20 countries, December 30
The New York Times: Why Covid Death Rates Are Rising for Some Groups, December 28
NBC News: From zero to 500 million: America’s vaccination effort in 4 charts, December 30

The current surge has worsened a shortage of medical workers:

Financial Times: England’s Covid infection rate climbs to one person in 25, December 31
The Washington Post: Nursing home staff shortages are worsening problems at overwhelmed hospitals, December 28
The Washington Post:The most unusual job market in modern American history, explained, December 29

On the anniversary of the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, these charts looked back at a year of violent political speech. Meanwhile, FiveThirtyEight explained why the president’s party will have an uphill battle in midterm elections:

The Washington Post: Facebook groups topped 10,000 daily attacks on election before Jan. 6, analysis shows, January 4
Reuters: Anatomy of a death threat, December 30
FiveThirtyEight: Why The President’s Party Almost Always Has A Bad Midterm, January 3

Finally, maps this week focused on land use, with a side of Erasmus student exchanges:

El País: Lanzarote: la isla que no quería crecer tanto, December 31
The Washington Post: This tree has stood here for 500 years. Will it be sold for $17,500?, December 30
Bloomberg: Buffett-, Anschutz-Backed Power Lines Get Deal to Move Forward, December 28
El Confidencial: Erasmus a dos velocidades, December 28

What else we found interesting

ATLO: Magyarország Domborzata, December 31
Miami Herald: House of Cards, December 30
The New York Times: When They Warn of Rare Disorders, These Prenatal Tests Are Usually Wrong, January 1

Help us make this dispatch better! We’d love to hear which newsletters, blogs, or social media accounts we need to follow to learn about interesting projects, especially from less-covered parts of the world (Asia, South America, Africa). Write us at hello@datawrapper.de or leave a comment below.

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