The best response to that bogus 1929 parallels chart yet
Not every permabear is in hibernation.
This "scary parallel" chart, comparing the Dow Jones Industrial Average now and back in 1929 has been floating around since late last year, and it's a really great example of how not to do to charts.
It's supposed to encourage the reader to think that another crash is imminent. Obviously this is classic correlation-causation fallacy. Just because an index climbed in this way before, does not mean it will tumble in the same way again.
Twitter's Pawel Morski has done the leg work required to illustrate how this data should be represented – using percentage increases.
Scary parallel my arse. pic.twitter.com/omyovAKQaX
— Paweł Morski (@Pawelmorski) February 11, 2014
But this new chart has to be our favourite. It takes the Dow Jones from 1921 to 1930 and also global temperatures from 1909-2013.
Scary parallel. Dow Jones 1921-1930 vs global temperature 1909-2013 (Hadcrut). Global freeze ahead? ht @kentindell pic.twitter.com/2biXvEbWfY
— grodaeu (@grodaeu) February 17, 2014
Clearly we should brace ourselves for a new ice age. Or something.