Tag Archives: data source

Rick Nevin has an excellent post, Update: Continuing trend toward zero youth incarceration (1/18/2023), that summarizes trends in incarceration rates.  There are five interesting graphs, but the one here might surprise folks the most.  There has been steady decrease in the gap between Black male incarceration rates and the overall male incarceration rates. Some quotes:

It is remarkable – and exasperating – that the debate over crime and incarceration almost entirely ignores divergent trends by age. Youth crime and incarceration are vanishing as arrest and incarceration rates are still increasing for adults over 50. The only crime theory that explains this divergence is the impact of birth year trends in preschool lead exposure.

The steeper decline in Black incarceration rates since 2001 reflects the fact that Black children recorded steeper blood lead declines associated with slum clearance over the 1960s and city air lead declines since the early-1970s (explained here).

I don’t think it is widely known that youth incarceration rates have been decreasing while over 50 have been increasing.

It is especially exasperating that criminal justice reform advocates ignore incarceration trends by age. Those trends should inform incarceration reduction strategies, to have the greatest impact and to generate the least resistance from “tough-on-crime” advocates.

We do not have a “mass incarceration” problem for youths. Not anymore. Reductions in preschool lead exposure have caused massive declines in youth crime and incarceration. We do still have mass incarceration for adults over 50, and it’s getting worse.

There are links to the data in the first sentence. Check out my lead crime project in the Statistics Projects section.

Currently, 2022 is the record minimum for Antarctic sea ice extent, but based on the graph here from the Charctic Interactive Sea Ice Graph from NSIDC 2023 seems primed to beat that record.  The Charctic interactive Sea Ice Graph is a fun tool that lets users select years to graph. The menu at the top allows for downloading images as well as data.

You probably looked at the graph already and know the answer, Florida. The graph is from the Census Bureau article New Florida Estimates Show Nation’s Third-Largest State Reaching Historic Milestone by Marc Perry, Luke Rogers and Kristie Wilder (12/22/2022). This leaves us with more questions than answers, which we’ll get to. First,

After decades of rapid population increase, Florida now is the nation’s fastest-growing state for the first time since 1957, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Vintage 2022 population estimates released today.

Florida’s population increased by 1.9% to 22,244,823 between 2021 and 2022, surpassing Idaho, the previous year’s fastest-growing state.

Florida wins by percent but did Florida add the most population?

Increasing by 470,708 people since July 2021, Texas was the largest-gaining state in the nation, reaching a total population of 30,029,572. By crossing the 30-million-population threshold this past year, Texas joins California as the only states with a resident population above 30 million. Growth in Texas last year was fueled by gains from all three components: net domestic migration (230,961), net international migration (118,614), and natural increase (118,159).

Florida was the fastest-growing state in 2022, with an annual population increase of 1.9%, resulting in a total resident population of 22,244,823.

If Florida grew by 1.9% and was the fastest, what was the U.S. growth?

After a historically low rate of change between 2020 and 2021, the U.S. resident population increased by 0.4%, or 1,256,003, to 333,287,557 in 2022, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Vintage 2022 national and state population estimates and components of change released today.

The last two quotes are from the Census Bureau press release Growth in U.S. Population Shows Early Indication of Recovery Amid COVID-19 Pandemic (12/22/2022). Plenty of QL uses for these articles and you can follow the link in the last quote for data.

The world ban blog looks at fertilizer prices in the post Fertilizer prices ease but affordability and availability issues linger by John Baffes and Wee Chian Koh (1/5/2023).  In Europe

The sharp increase in natural gas prices in Europe has led to widespread production cutbacks in ammonia—an important input for nitrogen fertilizers. As of October 2022, about 70% of European ammonia production capacity had been reduced or shut down.  However, input costs have declined in recent months due to increase imports of liquefied natural for national reserves in Europe as well as expectations of a milder winter. This could allow some shuttered nitrogen fertilizer production facilities in Europe to resume operations.

In China

Supply concerns have been exacerbated by China’s extension of export restrictions on fertilizers until the end of 2022 in order to maintain domestic availability. DAP exports from China, which accounts for 30% of global trade in DAP, fell by nearly 50% (y/y) during the first ten months of 2022. Meanwhile, Chinese urea exports declined by about 60% (y/y) over the same period.

There are four graphs and a link to the Commodity Markets page that has a bunch of data.

From NOAA’s November 2022 Global Climate Report:

The November 2022 global surface temperature departure was the ninth highest for November in the 143-year record at 0.76°C (1.37°F) above the 20th century average of 12.9°C (55.2°F). Despite ranking among the ten warmest Novembers on record, this November was the coolest November since 2014. November 2022 marked the 46th consecutive November and the 455th consecutive month with temperatures, at least nominally, above the 20th century average.

A few of highlights:

Europe tied 2000 for its third-warmest November on record.

The contiguous U.S. had a November that was 0.7°F cooler than average.

However, New Zealand recorded its warmest November on record according to its state meteorological agency. The warmest three Novembers in New Zealand have all occurred since 2019.

Time series data is available near the top of the page.

The eia post Natural gas consumption in the industrial sector has grown slowly in recent years by Mike Kopalek (12/12/2022) provides the graph copied here. What may be more interesting is what all this natural gas is used for. A few highlights:

Natural gas used to produce fertilizer is one of the largest chemical feedstocks.

Methanol (CH₃OH), a natural gas-derived substance that’s widely used as a precursor for chemical derivatives, is another one of the largest chemical feedstock uses for natural gas. In recent years, the United States added significant methanol production capacity, particularly in Texas and Louisiana.

Crude oil refineries are an important natural gas consumer as well, accounting for about 14% of all industrial natural gas consumption in 2021.

Read the article for the details. There are links to the data source.

The answer to the question depends on where you live, which will dictate the odds of snow on the ground on Dec 25.  If you aren’t sure then take a look at the map on the NOAA’s climate.gov article Interactive map: Are you dreaming of a white Christmas? by Rebecca Lindsey and Susan Osborne (12/6/2022).

The interactive map on the page allows you to zoom in on a dot and get information about the chance of at least an inch of snow on the ground on Dec 25.  Here in Ithaca we have a 51% chance of at least an inch of snow on the ground. The page includes links to other maps and at the bottom there are links to other snow related resources. There is a link to download a spreadsheet of the data which includes the state and location name, along with elevation and the chance of snow. Is there relationship between elevation and snow on Dec 25? This seems like a stats project in the making.

In a follow up to the last post, How much has sea level risen locally? (12/1/2022), we have the IPCC Sea Level Projection Tool. The NOAA sea level trends tool looks at the historic data and adds linear regression lines. The IPCC tool has projections based on the different IPCC scenarios. For example, when you first land on the page you will see blue dots on a map. A dot with a number means there are a cluster of dots nearby so zoom in.  I went to the Miami beach dot. Click on the dot and then click full projections. This will bring you to a page with two interactive maps. The first is a curve of seal level change (relative to the 1995-2014 baseline) projected out to 2150. You can select one of the six IPCC scenarios.

The other graph, seen here, allows you to select an increase in sea level and provides estimates for when that will occur, with the black circle being the median year.  The graph here is the data at which we see about one foot of sea level rise in Miami. In both graphs there is a link to download the data.

A related article from NASA, NASA Study: Rising Sea Level Could Exceed Estimates for U.S. Coasts by Sally Younger (11/15/2022) provides some interesting context such as:

The hazards of rising sea level are amplified by natural variabilities on Earth.

For instance, by the mid-2030s, every U.S. coast will experience more intense high-tide floods due to a wobble in the Moon’s orbit that occurs every 18.6 years. Hamlington said that this lunar cycle, in combination with rising sea level, is projected to worsen the impacts of high-tide flooding during the 2030s and 2040s.

The World Bank Data Blog provides information on food prices in the article Food prices eased but risks remain elevated by John Baffes & Kaltrina Temaj (11/21/2022)

The World Bank’s Food Price Index declined 12% in the third quarter of 2022 (q/q) after reaching an all-time high in April. The index remains almost 20% higher than a year ago.  In domestic currency terms, however, food prices remain elevated due to currency deprecations. Food prices are expected to fall 5% in 2023 before stabilizing in 2024. Despite the expected declines, most food prices will remain high by historical norms. The forecasts are also subjected to numerous risks.

The article has total of 7 graphs, most of them are interactive, and interesting information:

Supply disruptions, increasing production costs, and appreciation of the U.S. dollar have exerted upward pressure on domestic food price inflation in most countries.  Food price inflation in South Asia averaged 20% in the first three quarters of 2022 (y/y); the average for most other regions was 14%. The exception was the East Asia and the Pacific region where food price inflation averaged just 6%, in part due to stable rice prices, a key staple in the region.

There are links to the data but it may take some work to get it. This is a rich QL article. For example, a good assignment is use the graph to verify the percentages in the first quote above.

From NOAA’s October 2022 Global Climate Report:

October 2022 was the fourth-warmest October in NOAA’s 143-year record. The October global surface temperature was 1.60°F (0.89°C) above the 20th-century average of 57.1°F (14.0°C). The past seven Octobers were among the ten warmest Octobers on record.

A few highlights:

Europe had its warmest October on record at 2.6°C (4.6°F) above the 1910-2000 average. This surpassed the previous record, set in 2020, by 0.38°C (0.68°F). More than seven countries in Europe recorded their warmest or joint-warmest October on record.

Austria had its warmest October on record. Austria’s national weather service reported that the average temperature was 2.8°C above the 1991-2020 baseline in the lowlands, and 4.0°C warmer in the mountains.

According to MeteoSwiss, Switzerland had its warmest October since the country began its records in 1865, with an average temperature 3.7°C above the 1991-2020 average.

Belgium tied 2001 for its warmest October on record, 3.1°C warmer than the 1991-2020 average, according to Belgium’s Royal Meteorological Institute.

MeteoFrance reported that France had its warmest October since records began in 1945, about 3.5°C above the 1991-2020 normal.

The time series data is available near the top of the page under Additional Resources.