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In 2021, the U.S. brought in approximately $2.83 trillion worth of goods from its various international trading partners.
But what types of goods are most commonly imported throughout different parts of America? This graphic by OnDeck shows the top import in every U.S. state, using January 2022 data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
Petroleum is the most popular import in 12 states, making it the most common import across America. In 2021, about 72% of imported petroleum was crude oil, which was then domestically refined into products like gasoline, diesel, or jet fuel.
A majority of that imported petroleum came from Canada, while roughly 11% was imported from OPEC countries, and 8% came from Russia. Of course, the latter figure will likely dip in 2022 because of the ban on Russian imports implemented by the Biden administration in response to the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
After petroleum, vehicles and medicine were tied for the second most-imported goods, with both categories being the most popular import in six states each.
Somewhat related to medicine are nucleic acids, which were the top imports in Florida and Nebraska. Nucleic acids are natural polymers that are used in biological processes like protein synthesis or messenger RNA (mRNA) translation. It’s worth noting that several COVID-19 vaccines, including those produced by Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech, are mRNA vaccines.
In addition to outlining the most popular imports in each U.S. state, OnDeck highlights each state’s most unique import, visualized in the graphic below.
OnDeck defines each state’s “most unique” import as the category of goods that was imported by the fewest other states.
Salmon was Florida’s most unique import. This makes sense considering the Sunshine State is home to some of the country’s biggest seafood wholesalers, including North Star Seafood (owned by Sysco) and Tampa Bay Fisheries.
Another example is Delaware’s high imports of pineapples, totaling around $60.2 million in pineapples per year. This time, the culprit is Dole plc (formerly the Dole Food Company), the largest producer of fruit and vegetables in the world. Until 2021, the company’s headquarters were based in Delaware, and it still receives pineapple imports to the Port of Wilmington in the state’s largest city.
This article was published as a part of Visual Capitalist's Creator Program, which features data-driven visuals from some of our favorite Creators around the world.
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This infographic highlights the accelerating pace of layoffs so far in 2022, as businesses cut costs ahead of a potential recession.
Hiring freezes and layoffs are becoming more common in 2022, as U.S. businesses look to slash costs ahead of a possible recession.
Understandably, this has a lot of people worried. In June 2022, Insight Global found that 78% of American workers fear they will lose their job in the next recession. Additionally, 56% said they aren’t financially prepared, and 54% said they would take a pay cut to avoid being laid off.
In this infographic, we’ve visualized major layoffs announced in 2022 by publicly-traded U.S. corporations.
Note: Due to gaps in reporting, as well as the very large number of U.S. corporations, this list may not be comprehensive.
Layoffs have surged considerably since April of this year. See the table below for high-profile instances of mass layoffs.
Here’s a brief rundown of these layoffs, sorted by industry.
Ford has announced the biggest round of layoffs this year, totalling roughly 8,000 salaried employees. Many of these jobs are in Ford’s legacy combustion engine business. According to CEO Jim Farley, these cuts are necessary to fund the company’s transition to EVs.
We absolutely have too many people in some places, no doubt about it. – Jim Farley, CEO, Ford
Speaking of EVs, Rivian laid off 840 employees in July, amounting to 6% of its total workforce. The EV startup pointed to inflation, rising interest rates, and increasing commodity prices as factors. The firm’s more established competitor, Tesla, cut 200 jobs from its autopilot division in the month prior.
Last but not least is online used car retailer, Carvana, which cut 2,500 jobs in May. The company experienced rapid growth during the pandemic, but has since fallen out of grace. Year-to-date, the company’s shares are down more than 80%.
Fearing an impending recession, Coinbase has shed 1,100 employees, or 18% of its total workforce. Interestingly, Coinbase does not have a physical headquarters, meaning the entire company operates remotely.
A recession could lead to another crypto winter, and could last for an extended period. In past crypto winters, trading revenue declined significantly. Brian Armstrong, CEO, Coinbase
Around the same time, JPMorgan Chase & Co. announced it would fire hundreds of home-lending employees. While an exact number isn’t available, we’ve estimated this to be around 500 jobs, based on the original Bloomberg article. Wells Fargo, another major U.S. bank, has also cut 197 jobs from its home mortgage division.
The primary reason for these cuts is rising mortgage rates, which are negatively impacting the demand for homes.
Within tech, Meta and Twitter are two of the most high profile companies to begin making layoffs. In Meta’s case, 350 custodial staff have been let go due to reduced usage of the company’s offices.
Many more cuts are expected, however, as Facebook recently reported its first revenue decline in 10 years. CEO Mark Zuckerberg has made it clear he expects the company to do more with fewer resources, and managers have been encouraged to report “low performers” for “failing the company”.
Realistically, there are probably a bunch of people at the company who shouldn’t be here. – Mark Zuckerberg, CEO, Meta
Also in July, Twitter laid off 30% of its talent acquisition team. An exact number was not available, but the team was estimated to have less than 100 employees. The company has also enacted a hiring freeze as it stumbles through a botched acquisition by Elon Musk.
Layoffs are expected to continue throughout the rest of this year, as metrics like consumer sentiment enter a decline. Rising interest rates, which make it more expensive for businesses to borrow money, are also having a negative impact on growth.
In fact just a few days ago, trading platform Robinhood announced it was letting go 23% of its staff. After accounting for its previous layoffs in April (9% of the workforce), it’s fair to estimate that this latest round will impact nearly 800 people.
Bad weather, the war in Ukraine, and a shortage of fertilizer have led to fears of a global food crisis. Here are three factors you should know.
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Bad weather, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and a shortage of fertilizer have led to fears of a global food crisis.
This infographic will help you understand the problem by highlighting three key factors behind the mounting food crisis.
Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the war has disrupted shipments of fertilizer, an essential source of nutrients for crops.
Russia is the world’s top exporter of nitrogen fertilizer and ranks second in phosphorus and potassium fertilizer exports. Belarus, a Russian ally also contending with Western sanctions, is another major fertilizer producer. In addition, both countries collectively account for over 40% of global exports of the crop nutrient potash.
Here are the top 20 fertilizer exporters globally:
The main destination of fertilizer exports from Russia are large economies like India, Brazil, China, and the United States.
However, many developing countries—including Mongolia, Honduras, Cameroon, Ghana, Senegal, and Guatemala—rely on Russia for at least one-fifth of their fertilizer imports.
Furthermore, the war intensified trends that were already disrupting supply, such as increased hoarding by major producing nations like China and sharp jumps in the price of natural gas, a key feedstock for fertilizer production.
The blockade of Ukrainian ports by Russia’s Black Sea fleet, along with Western sanctions against Russia, has worsened global supply chain bottlenecks, causing inflation in food and energy prices around the world.
This is largely because Russia and Ukraine together account for nearly one-third of the global wheat supply. Wheat is one of the most-used crops in the world annually, used to make a variety of food products like bread and pasta. Additionally, Ukraine is also a major exporter of corn, barley, sunflower oil, and rapeseed oil.
As a result of the blockade, Ukraine’s exports of cereals and oilseed dropped from six million tonnes to two million tonnes per month. After two months of negotiations, the two countries signed a deal to reopen Ukrainian Black Sea ports for grain exports, raising hopes that the international food crisis can be eased.
Besides the war in Ukraine, factors including the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change resulted in nearly one billion people going hungry last year, according to United Nations.
France’s wine industry saw its smallest harvest since 1957 in 2021, with an estimated loss of $2 billion in sales due to increasingly higher temperatures and extreme weather conditions.
Heat, drought, and floods also decimated crops in Latin America, North America, and India in recent months. Between April 2020 and December 2021, coffee prices increased 70% after droughts and frost destroyed crops in Brazil.
In the face of multiple crises, the World Bank recently announced financial support of up to $30 billion to existing and new projects in areas such as agriculture, nutrition, social protection, water, and irrigation.
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