Data is Plural “is a weekly newsletter of useful/curious datasets.” Here’s their archive.
https://opendata.stackexchange.com/
Language
Last year, more than 2 million people applied for new Social Security retirement and survivor benefits. When they did, they indicated their preferred language. More than 93% said English, and about 5% of applicants said Spanish — the second most popular choice. Among the 88 other options: 1,616 applicants chose American Sign Language, 32 chose Japanese, nine chose Yiddish, and one chose Swedish.
Education
https://www.presidentsalliance.org/immigrant-origin-students-in-u-s-higher-education/ NAFSA IPEDS: Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System PEN American Index of Educational Gag Orderscritical-race-theoryideology
Council on Social Work Education, Statistics on Social Work Education in the United States
Immigration
https://www.higheredimmigrationportal.org American Immigration Council Open Doors Migration Policy Institute
The Department of State publishes demographic reports on refugee arrivals since 2002. The data includes country of origin, resettlement city and state, religion, age, gender, and more. Related: At BuzzFeed, I used the data to chart the past decade of refugee arrivals. Also related: The UN’s refugee data portal. [Data is Plural]
- http://www.wrapsnet.org/Reports/InteractiveReporting/tabid/393/Default.aspx
- http://www.buzzfeed.com/jsvine/where-us-refugees-come-from-and-go-in-charts
- http://popstats.unhcr.org/en/overview
Police
Traffic stops
This weekend, the New York Times published a front-page article on “the disproportionate risk of driving while black.” Among other findings: “officers were more likely to conduct [searches] when the driver was black, even though they consistently found drugs, guns or other contraband more often if the driver was white.” The investigation drew on several statewide traffic-stop datasets that track the race and gender of stopped drivers. The “seven states with the most sweeping reporting requirements,” in order of how easy it seems (to me) to get detailed data: Connecticut, North Carolina, Missouri, Nebraska, Maryland, Illinois, and Rhode Island. [Data is Plural]
- http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/25/us/racial-disparity-traffic-stops-driving-black.html
- http://ctrp3.ctdata.org/
- http://trafficstops.ncdoj.gov/Default.aspx?pageid=2
- https://www.ago.mo.gov/home/vehicle-stops-report
- http://www.ncc.nebraska.gov/statistics/trafficstops/
- http://www.goccp.maryland.gov/msac/law-enforcement.php
- http://www.idot.illinois.gov/transportation-system/local-transportation-partners/law-enforcement/illinois-traffic-stop-study
- http://www.ri.gov/press/view/23152
The Department of Justice is authorized to investigate police departments that display a “pattern or practice” of civil rights violations. In April, the Marshall Project began publishing a spreadsheet of the DOJ investigations into local law enforcement. The dataset, which is updated regularly, indicates when each case began, when it ended, and what type of agreement (if any) was reached. The latest entry: An investigation into the Chicago Police Department, announced last week. Related: PBS Frontline’s interactive map of DOJ investigations. [h/t Tom Meagher] [Data is Plural]
- https://github.com/themarshallproject/doj14141/blob/master/data/doj_data.csv
- https://github.com/themarshallproject/doj14141#the-department-of-justices-14141-civil-rights-investigations
- http://apps.frontline.org/fixingtheforce/
Firearms
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives publishes a searchable and downloadable licensing database. License-holders fall into eleven categories. Among them: run-of-the-mill dealers, ammunition manufacturers, collectors of “curios and relics,” pawnbrokers, and importers of “destructive devices.” The ATF’s website contains monthly and state-by-state archives. [h/t Marc DaCosta] [Correction, 2015-11-04: There are only nine categories of license-holders. The published ATF data includes only eight of them; it does not include “Collector of Curios and Relics.” Thanks to @MikeStucka for flagging this mistake.] [Data is Plural]
- https://data.atf.gov/Licensees/Federal-Firearms-Licensee-Listing-2010-to-2015/qg4c-kex6
- https://www.atf.gov/firearms/curios-relics
- https://www.atf.gov/firearms/firearms-guides-importation-verification-firearms-national-firearms-act-definitions-1
- https://www.atf.gov/firearms/listing-federal-firearms-licensees-ffls-2015
Mass shootings in America
ShootingTracker.com provides datasets listing all U.S. mass shootings — defined as “when four or more people are shot in an event, or related series of events” — since 2013. So far in 2015, mass shootings have killed 447 people and wounded an additional 1,292.
Last week, Data Is Plural highlighted ShootingTracker.com, a source for data on shootings that wounded at least four people. Other resources include the Gun Violence Archive and Mother Jones’ detailed database of mass shootings since 1982. The Mother Jones database takes narrower approach, focusing on shootings that killed at least four people in a public setting. In a New York Times op-ed, published shortly after last week’s San Bernardino shooting, the editor behind that database argues that broader methodologies don’t distinguish between a “a 1 a.m. gang fight” and “the madness that just played out in Southern California.” A Washington Post article weighs the pros and cons of broader and narrower approaches. [h/t Robin Shields + Mark Follman + Christopher Ingraham]
- https://tinyletter.com/data-is-plural/letters/data-is-plural-2015-12-02-edition
- http://shootingtracker.com/wiki/Main_Page
- http://www.gunviolencearchive.org/methodology
- http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/12/mass-shootings-mother-jones-full-data
- http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/04/opinion/how-many-mass-shootings-are-there-really.html
- https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/12/03/what-makes-a-mass-shooting-in-america/