Michael P. Falco

Powerful images convey world’s inequality

by Michael Falco, account assistant

I am a words man, I have been for most of my adult life. Words carry power. If you arrange the right string of thoughts, drawing on your own experience and connect it to people’s lives, well, you can move mountains. Of course, words also disappoint. Words have long just been a prelude to undelivered dreams and broken promises.

I know people who feel the same way about images. Rarely do I find myself more compelled and enthralled by an image than the written word.

Until just recently. These apparently have been around for some time, but they just crossed my radar. Instead of basing the maps on actual size, it creates a rendering of the world based on certain attributes: military spending, war and death, wealth distribution and so on.

A single image can tell long, complex and often tragic realities about the world we live. These are prime examples of how we should constantly look for new, innovative and compelling methods for telling stories. Through this, we can really move people to see the world differently and hopefully act. Here are the images that moved me most:

Death and War

This is how the map reshapes if each country were sized according to the amount of war and death taking place. The Democratic Republic of Congo accounted for 26 percent of the war and death.

Military Spending

As if anybody should be surprised the U.S. dwarfs all other countries in military spending.

Wealth

There's not much I can say here...

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