Political Visual Data Presentation

By Taylor Marvin

Without considering content, Ryan’s video is a particularly well-made presentation, especially in its visually effective use of graphs. I hope these presentations become more common in government- they give politicians the opportunity to convey more detailed information than in speeches or interviews, and encourage a more rigorous use of data in politics. The White House Office of Management and Budget has experimented with something similar:

Voters often have spectacularly uninformed opinions about the federal budget, and when used well visual presentations are an important tool to correct voter ignorance in an accessible way. However, these presentations are only as good as the data they contain, and can just as easily be used to present biased or incomplete information. Let’s hope they become more common, but are used responsibly.