Most members of Congress have little direct military experience
Veterans make up a smaller share of Congress than at any time in the past five decades.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
Drew DeSilver
Senior Writer/Editor
Drew DeSilver is a senior writer at Pew Research Center.
Publications
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Current Congress is not the least productive in recent history, but close
Updated data on the legislative productivity of the 113th Congress is available here. As Congress gets ready to return from its August recess and address the pressing issue of whether to take action in Syria, it does so amid largely unfavorable views from the public. Seven-in-ten Americans have a “very” or “mostly” unfavorable opinion of […]
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Chart of the Week: The “black budget”
Using documents obtained from former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, The Washington Post has published the first-ever detailed look at the U.S. government’s intelligence spending — the “black budget,” so called because, though the overall spending figure has been made public since 2007, the specifics have not. For its combination of newsworthiness, clear and efficient presentation […]
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Black incomes are up, but wealth isn’t
Although household-income growth for African-Americans has outpaced that of whites since the 1960s, those gains haven’t led to any narrowing of the wealth gap between the races.
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King’s “I have a dream” speech, by the numbers
Martin Luther King Jr.’s speech 50 years ago today on Washington D.C.’s National Mall and Memorial Parks has become one of the most famous, and quoted, pieces of oratory in U.S. history (though that wasn’t apparent to everyone at the time). But how well have the aspirations King so memorably expressed been realized? We ran […]
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Can we all get along? For most, the answer is yes
Most blacks, whites and Hispanics say they get along reasonably well with each other — and at modestly higher levels than in the recent past.
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Chart of the Week: Race, ethnicity and local government jobs
The Chart of the Week illustrates that whites continue to be overrepresented among high-earning local government jobs, long a source for upward social mobility, but the workforces have become more diversified over the past five decades.
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Black unemployment rate is consistently twice that of whites
Much has changed for African-Americans since the 1963 March on Washington (which, recall, was a march for “Jobs and Freedom”), but one thing hasn’t: The unemployment rate among blacks is still about double that among whites, as it has been for most of the past six decades.
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Public social expenditures falling in most countries but still above pre-crisis levels
New economic figures from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development showed an increase in public spending among developed countries during the global financial crisis, but a survey of European nations indicated publics were now looking to ratchet it down.
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Chart of the Week: Food stamp enrollment by state, over time
Participation in the federal food stamp program soared following the 2008-09 financial crisis. Our chart of the week, from the Wall Street Journal, shows how the participation rate differed by state.