Inflation & Impermanence
Illumination with Diligence
Two for the price of one - 2 images (Source: Visual Capitalist) that tell powerful stories.
Virtually Cheap & Really Expensive
Notice the stark differences in the changes in prices for (US) households over the last 22 years. Technology & globalization clearly have had a massive impact on prices for devices & software. But real-world goods like education, housing and healthcare have seen huge price increases. “Bits” have become cheaper, “atoms” become much more expensive.
Impernanence is Everything
This infographic, created in 1931 by American John Sparks (& published by Rand McNally), maps the ebbs and flows of global power going all the way back to 2,000 B.C. on one river of time, is an ambitious attempt at fitting a mountain of historical information onto a five-foot-long poster. The poster cost $1 at the time, or $18 today after accounting for inflation.
Although the distribution of power is not quantitatively defined on the x-axis, it provides an interesting way of looking at historic civilizations in relative terms. See the rise & fall of the Egyptian, Roman, Assyrian, Mongol and other civilizations. The Visual Capitalist site also has a high resolution image if you get smitten.
Crowning a world leader at certain points in history is relatively easy, but divvying up influence or power across 4,000 years requires some creativity, and guesswork.
How might Pax Americana compare on this map (if this were stretched to 2020) with the Egyptians or Mongols at their peak?
What might a more fragmented multi-polar world in 2050 look like?
John Spark’s ‘histomap’ was an admirable attempt at making history more approachable and entertaining. Today, we have limitless access to information, but in the 1930s an all encompassing timeline of history would have been groundbreaking. Work like this paved the way for the modern data visualizations that help us better understand the world today.