STATISTICA Blogs

 As a result of the Occupy Wall Street Movement bringing concerns about income inequality to the news cycle, my goal was to find data related to this topic. I didn’t have an agenda, really – I just wanted to be able to confirm or deny whether their claims are legitimate. 

Of course, the data were easy to get. It’s found here at the Census Bureau’s website. It shows mean income for each Fifth of households on an annual basis from 1967 to 2010. All values are shown in 2010 dollars, which adjusts for changes in purchasing power over time. 

 I can definitely relate to the last blog post from my colleague Jennifer Thompson, for I too have a common name for people in my age cohort. I was so tired of having to clarify which Amanda I was that I so desperately wanted to coin the nickname “Shank” for myself. It didn’t catch on for some reason.

You can check out for yourself using Social Security Administration data how common your first name was for US babies born the same year you were. There are 2010 data available as well as yearly data going back to 1880.  Name Voyager is also a fun one to look at for expectant parents and narcissists alike. 

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I took an Intro to Statistics course in the Psychology Department at the University of Oklahoma. I am so happy I took this class, both because it helped me start out on the somewhat squiggly path to working at StatSoft and because it was a great foundation for understanding experimental research, probability, statistical significance, correlation vs. causation, and other concepts that are generally useful for a functioning adult to know.  

We did old-school pencil and paper graphing in that class. Not only because the printer that the department used for printing out statistical output was the next building over and the size of an office, but because it helped us get some hands-on understanding of what types of graphs are used when. 

 

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I love election time. The Tuesday after the first Monday in November in even-numbered years is like Super Bowl Sunday for me. Yes, I do order pizza. Yet, I didn’t watch the Republican Presidential Primary Debate last night. I feel ashamed by this.

In order to redeem myself as a political junkie, I thought I’d post about the debate anyway. I grabbed the transcript from The New York Times, and ran it through a simple STATISTICA Text Miner analysis.  What we’re left with is a visualized gist of what was said last night during the debate.

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As a former Girl Scout and lover of creative graphs, I wholeheartedly approve of this. You know what else I wholeheartedly approve of? Thin Mints.

via I Love Charts, original source Wired Magazine

 

 It’s back-to-school week for many of us. My daughter started a new school.  She loves it, though I’m pretty sure the love is highly correlated with the new playground and her new pink backpack and lunch bag at this point. The world she is growing up in is so much different than the one that anyone in their 20s or older grew up in. Education today is less about going to school or the library and stuffing your head full of information, and more about knowing that the information is out there and ready to be found and used.  

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Non-Farm employment is down almost 1% from April 2001 to April 2011. Not un-employment.  Employment. This sounds far worse when you consider that the US Census Bureau estimates that our population increases by one net person every 12 seconds. It’s like a game of musical chairs, except that more players are entering the game as time goes by. 

Are you going to be able to find a chair the next time the music stops?

 

A few years ago, I was in rural West Texas looking for headstones of family members in a cemetery. Fun way to spend a Saturday, right? It was nearly record-setting heat in July, and I didn’t bring enough water with me. The search took longer than any of us had expected and by the time I was thirsty, I was starting to feel awful. I found a rusty faucet in the ground and frantically turned the handle. I didn’t care if it was treated water that was safe to drink or not. It was wet, and that’s all that mattered. 

 

 

The news says that gas prices are high. I say that I’m amazed that I can drive to visit my mom in a nearby state for the mere cost of 6.5 pounds of cheddar cheese. Actually, I’ve never said that before until now. But it’s true. I don’t like making tradeoffs in my budget for gasoline either. However, when I look at the alternatives to driving to see Mom, it seems a lot better than walking there or taking a horse and wagon or not ever seeing her again. When you hear about things like high gas prices, your instinct may be to avoid summer travel, which is a perfectly reasonable economic instinct. Though, if you don’t travel, are you just going to stay home and stare at the wall?  

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If you haven’t figured it out by now, I’m kind of a nerd. I heard on the news the other day that home prices are falling once again, and my first thought was “I want to see that graphed!” rather than “Oh no, the economy is collapsing!” 

I grabbed the Case Shiller Home Price index information and plotted it as a simple time series in a Line Plot. Easy. But paraphrasing the words that Tina Turner sang: “I never do nothin’ nice and easy.”