Confusing Column Chart
With the title, "Two Charts Which Show That April Was A Horrible Month For American Manufacturing," I would expect to see clear, easy-to-interpret charts. This one is not.
Here are Business Insider's introductory text and the chart:
"If there is an American manufacturing renaissance, it certainly appears to have stalled in April.
"From the just-released ADP report, a chart which shows that manufacturing actually lost jobs in the month!"
Granted, this chart is very colorful, and overall, the numbers generally decline since November 12. But how can the chart be improved? Consider the following:
- Including a message title
- Adding data labels
- Choosing a different (or supplemental) chart type
- Highlighting most relevant data graphically and numerically
The purpose of the chart is to show that manufacturing lost jobs in April. Do we know exactly how many-both as a percentage and raw number? This would seem to be an important part of the argument.