Although much has been said about the demographic composition of the United States Congress, much less has been said about the thousands of staffers who work behind the scenes, drafting legislation, interacting with constituents, and advising their congressperson. The National Journal has created two infographics that attempt to describe this silent, but influential workforce.
posted by schmod on Jun 20, 2011 - 19 comments

What Congress Would Look Like If It [Demographically] Represented America (full size infographic). Net worth of lawmakers (related, previously).
posted by OverlappingElvis on Apr 21, 2011 - 72 comments

Professors' global model forecasts civil unrest against governments - With protests spreading in the Middle East (now Yemen - not on the list) I thought this article and blog on a forecast model predicting "which countries will likely experience an escalation in domestic political violence [within the next five years]" was rather interesting. [more inside]
posted by kliuless on Jan 27, 2011 - 42 comments

The Gray And The Brown - why the baby boom generation's concerns about race may mean that it's stabbing itself in the back as it moves into retirement.
posted by Artw on Aug 19, 2010 - 66 comments

Census sensitivity. The Economist takes a look at the politics of enumeration.
posted by goo on Dec 23, 2007 - 14 comments

“With the number of human beings having increased more than six-fold in the past 200 years, the modern mind simply assumes that men and women . . . will always breed enough children to grow the population . . . Yet, for more than a generation now, well-fed, healthy, peaceful populations around the world have been producing too few children to avoid population decline. . . . Throughout the broad sweep of human history, there are many examples of people, or classes of people, who chose to avoid the costs of parenthood. Indeed, falling fertility is a recurring tendency of human civilization. Why then did humans not become extinct long ago? The short answer is patriarchy.”
posted by jason's_planet on Apr 26, 2007 - 79 comments

Where do you live, among a bastion of geeks, or sea of academia-phobes? US Census released the smartest cities, states, and counties with Seattle and Raleigh topping the cities. Also for those who are politically curious, of the top 15 states with Bachelor degrees 11 went to Gore, while 13 of the bottom 15 went to Bush.
posted by humbe on May 14, 2004 - 27 comments