Six-Chart Sunday – Things That Make You Go Huh?
6 Infographics + 1 Video (The Genius of TSA) + Upcoming book discussion (Keach Hagey's "The Optimist: Sam Altman, OpenAI & the Race to Win the Future") - 1/12 at 4:30pmET
In the course of reading & researching for this newsletter, I come across crazy data points from time to time. Here’s six of my recent favorites:
1. Regulatory Superpower, Innovation Laggard
“In 2024, the European Union quietly crossed a bizarre milestone: it earned more from punishing American tech giants than from taxing Europe’s own.” (Mario Nafwal)
2. Veritas?
“38% of undergraduates at Stanford this year are registered as having a disability, as are 21% at Harvard — both up from 5% in 2009.” (FT) (also “Accommodation Nation”)
3. Capitalism!
“A June 2025 survey of more than 3,000 NVIDIA employees revealed that a staggering 76–78% of respondents are now millionaires, with nearly half reporting a net worth exceeding $25 million.” (Yahoo Finance)
4. Capitalism?
“The U.S. government hadn’t taken a direct stake in a healthy commercial firm since at least the 1950s. [In 2025 it took] FOURTEEN, and more are on the way.” (Scott Lincicome, Cato Institute, “The Year America Went (Kinda) Socialist.”
5. Boy Moms Are Red, Girl Moms Are Blue
Democratic data guru David Shor found boy moms are 3% more Republican, while girl moms are 4% more Democratic. Child gender had no impact whatsoever on the fathers.
6. Making the Grade
“92% of grades in Women's Gender & Sexuality Studies classes at Yale are A or A- vs 55% in Mathematics.” (data from Yale, per ABC News)
Upcoming live discussion tomorrow (Monday, Jan 12th, 4:30pm), register here
VIDEO
An under-cover look at how the TSA foils terrorism. (Key & Peele made many great sketches but the 4 minutes here is among their very best).
Top chart — that data looks pretty questionable in terms of what they chose to throw in to get the graph they wanted. (Not surprised to see that given the source.)
The Meta GDPR fine was levied in 2023 but is rolled into 2024.
The Apple fine was from a very surprising court loss related to App Store fees in 2024 — would assume that’s a one-off. So framing this as “crossed a bizarre milestone” as if it’s a trend when it’s really outlier + seemingly some creative accounting is not exactly honest chart-making. There are other things to complain about re: European fines etc. Would be nice to see the situation represented with realistic data.
https://www.politico.eu/article/commission-scores-surprise-win-in-apple-tax-row/
The NVIDIA stat really jumped out at me. Creating that many millionaires in a single company is the kind of wealth generation people dont usualy see in their lifetime, and it shows what being early at the right place can do. I have a friend who joined a startup late and always kicks himself for not getting in earlier. These data points make you realize timing and optionality matter as much as talent.