# WTF Happened in 2012?

> A collection of long-term data charts aligned around 2011–2014.

This site presents 47 charts showing societal, economic, and behavioral trends from public data sources. There is no thesis, no narration. The data is presented without interpretation.

## Charts

### Social and Behavioral
- Time Spent with Friends — Average hours per day, US adults (BLS American Time Use Survey)
- Time Spent Partying / Socializing — Minutes per day, US adults (BLS American Time Use Survey)
- Average Time Spent Reading — Minutes per day, US adults (BLS American Time Use Survey)
- New York Times Article Length — Average word count per article (NYT Archive API)
- Web News Article Length — Average words per article (NOW Corpus, BYU)
- How People Spend Their Time — Minutes per day by activity (BLS American Time Use Survey)
- Below-Basic Reading Levels — Percent of adults, US (NCES PIAAC)
- Worry and Stress Levels — % experiencing stress yesterday, worldwide (Gallup World Poll)
- Searches for "Second Job" — Google Trends index, US (Google Trends)
- Young Adults Reporting No Sex — Share ages 18-30, zero partners (GSS, NORC)
- High School Football Participation — As % of all HS students (NFHS)
- Teen Depression Rate — % ages 12-17 with major depression (NSDUH, SAMHSA)

### Housing and Consumer Debt
- Median Sales Price of Houses — USD, United States (Census Bureau/HUD via FRED)
- Real Home Price Index — Case-Shiller, CPI-adjusted (S&P CoreLogic via FRED)
- Auto Loan Debt Outstanding — Billions USD (NY Fed)
- Auto Loan 90+ Day Delinquency Rate — Percent of balances (NY Fed)
- Total Consumer Credit Outstanding — Trillions USD (Federal Reserve via FRED)
- Federal Interest Payments on Debt — Billions USD (BEA via FRED)
- Federal Debt as % of GDP — Public debt held (CBO/Treasury via FRED)
- Federal Government Total Liabilities — Trillions USD (Federal Reserve Z.1)
- New York City Home Values — Typical home value (Zillow ZHVI)
- Self-Storage Occupancy Rates — National average (Neighbor.com)

### Wealth and Inequality
- Top 1% Share of Total Net Worth — Percent, US (Federal Reserve DFA)
- Corporate Profits After Tax — Trillions USD (BEA via FRED)
- Top 0.1% Share of Wealth — Ultra-rich wealth share (World Inequality Database)
- Financial Sector Gross Value Added — Billions USD (BEA via FRED)
- Diamond Import Price Index — US import prices (BLS via FRED)

### Financial Markets
- Fed Overnight Reverse Repo — Peak usage per year, Billions USD (NY Fed via FRED)
- S&P 500 Index — Year-end closing price (Yahoo Finance)
- Buffett Indicator — Market Cap to GDP Ratio (FRED)
- Shiller PE Ratio (CAPE) — Cyclically Adjusted Price-to-Earnings (multpl.com)
- S&P 500 Market Cap as % of GDP — Large-Cap Valuation Ratio (FRED)
- US Household Net Purchases of Equities — Trillions USD (FRED)
- S&P 500 Earnings Yield vs Inflation — Valuations vs Purchasing Power (multpl.com)
- US Stock Options Volume — Billions of Contracts per Year (OCC)
- Dollar Share of Global FX Reserves — Percent held in USD (IMF COFER)

### Technology
- Number of Satellites in Orbit — Active operational satellites (ESA/UCS)
- Space Debris Objects Tracked — Cataloged objects in orbit (NASA ODPO)
- Exponential Growth of YouTube Videos — Total uploaded, Millions (McGrady et al. 2023)
- Total Emojis Over Time — Count in Unicode Standard (Unicode Consortium)
- Smartphone Adoption Rate — Percent of US adults (Pew Research Center)

### Demographics and Macro
- US Birth Rates — Total fertility rate (Human Fertility Database)
- Mean Age at First Birth — Average age of mother (Human Fertility Database)
- Productivity: Output Per Hour Worked — Index, nonfarm business (BLS via FRED)

### Sports and Health
- Tommy John Surgery Counts — UCL reconstructions, MLB/MiLB (Jon Roegele)

### Media
- Trump TV Mentions — % of TV clips mentioning name (GDELT TV Archive)

### Companies
- Apple Market Cap — Trillions USD (CompaniesMarketCap)

## Data Sources

All data comes from public sources. No data has been fabricated or modified.

- Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED): https://fred.stlouisfed.org
- Bureau of Labor Statistics: https://www.bls.gov
- NY Federal Reserve: https://www.newyorkfed.org
- Census Bureau: https://www.census.gov
- Bureau of Economic Analysis: https://www.bea.gov
- Pew Research Center: https://www.pewresearch.org
- Gallup: https://www.gallup.com
- World Inequality Database: https://wid.world
- Human Fertility Database: https://www.humanfertility.org
- NCES/PIAAC: https://nces.ed.gov
- Unicode Consortium: https://unicode.org
- ESA Space Debris Office: https://www.esa.int
- NASA ODPO: https://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov
- GDELT Project: https://www.gdeltproject.org

## Links

- Homepage: https://wtfhappened2012.com/
- Contact: https://wtfhappened2012.com/contact.html
- About: https://wtfhappened2012.com/about.html
- Data Sources: https://wtfhappened2012.com/sources.html

## License

Data is from public sources. Site content is informational only.