A recent news release from The CalorieLab ranks the US states by obesity levels. And California is 41st with a declining relative rate! Of course the actual rate is going up, but we're getting fatter at a slower rate than the rest of the country. Yay.
The graph reminded me a bit of the 2004 US presidential election results (you can draw your own conclusions from that), and that motivated me too seek other correlations and sources of nice data and graphs. What I found way exceeded my expectations: StateMaster. This site is is a treasure chest of data and graphs and correlations. Looking for a chart of oral health as measured by loss of natural teeth by state? They have it. Want to compare that rate's correlation versus energy consumption as a percentage of GDP? No problem (and just what the heck is going on in West Virginia anyway?).
Besides feeding stereotypes, StateMaster is an great (and perhaps educational) way to spend 30 minutes. But remember correlations does not imply causation (except maybe in Louisiana).
The graph reminded me a bit of the 2004 US presidential election results (you can draw your own conclusions from that), and that motivated me too seek other correlations and sources of nice data and graphs. What I found way exceeded my expectations: StateMaster. This site is is a treasure chest of data and graphs and correlations. Looking for a chart of oral health as measured by loss of natural teeth by state? They have it. Want to compare that rate's correlation versus energy consumption as a percentage of GDP? No problem (and just what the heck is going on in West Virginia anyway?).Besides feeding stereotypes, StateMaster is an great (and perhaps educational) way to spend 30 minutes. But remember correlations does not imply causation (except maybe in Louisiana).
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