2022: The year in charts

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Our Charting the Path to the Next Normal series offers a daily chart that helps explain a changing world—as we strive for sustainable, inclusive growth. Here we’ve curated 22 of this year’s best data visualizations that have illuminated some of the key themes and trends covered in our publishing—inflation, geopolitical upheaval, evolving health priorities, inclusion, net zero, digital trust, and more. Together, they capture a lot of what our collective next normal looked and felt like in 2022. Browse through the charts below to learn more about the storylines that could resonate well beyond this year.


Resilience becomes essential

Leaders continue to confront multiple crises: a geopolitical conflict, rising inflation, the lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, and talent turnover. The challenges have called for broad resilience frameworks.

US employees have left and returned to the workforce for a number of reasons.
Most European and US Fortune 500 companies have scaled back operations in or exited Russia.
Prices for commodities are higher across the board.
The majority of people who quit their jobs in the past two years are not returning to the industries the left.
Resilient companies did better at the outset of the downturn and after.

Health priorities evolve beyond the pandemic

The COVID-19 crisis upended businesses and transformed health systems. As certain parts of the world shift from the pandemic to endemic stage, leaders across public and private sectors are exploring new ways of improving health outcomes.

National immunity levels have varying components and change constantly.
What is the impact of disease and ill health within the United States?
Around 20 percent of all Medicare, Medicaid, and commercial outpatient, emergency-department, and home health spending could be virtually enabled.
Surveyed nurses express an increased intention to leave direct patient care.

Inclusion opportunities abound

What does a more inclusive economy look like? Institutions across business, government, and society are taking action, but there’s more work to be done.

Venture capital firms fund Black beauty brands at lower rates and amounts than non-Black brands.
Bisexual and transgender employees are more likely than other surveyed employees to report experiencing microaggressions at work.
Toxic workplace behavior is the biggest driver of negative workplace outcomes, such as burnout and intent to leave.
Workers of color are underrepresented in the US industries with the highest-paying frontline roles.
Despite modest progress, women are still dramatically underrepresented in leadership roles.

Net zero has new urgency

The conflict in Ukraine and a volatile global economy may have complicated the net-zero transition, but the need to scale up climate solutions has never been more apparent. There’s an opportunity for bold leaders to build green businesses and protect the planet.

The NGFS Net Zero 2050 scenario would entail around $25 trillion more in cumulative investments over 30 years than the Current Policies scenario.
Eleven high-potential value pools could be worth more than $12 trillion of yearly revenues by 2030 as the net-zero transition advances.
Approximately 740,000 tons of end-of-life apparel textiles in California are expected to be landfilled; only about 5,000 tons are closed-loop recycled.

With innovation comes responsibility

Web3, innovations in the space industry, AI ethics: technology continues to present growth opportunities for companies and raises important questions. Developing digital trust with consumers could be key going forward.

The overall growth in the global semiconductor market is driven by the automotive, data storage, and wireless industries.
Consumers value digital trust

To get a roundup of these charts delivered weekly to your inbox, sign up for The Week in Charts newsletter at McKinsey.com/subscriptions.

Our data-visualization editors Richard Johnson, Matt Perry, Jonathon Rivait, and Jessica Wang created many of the charts featured in this collection and choose the best of their creations for our daily Charting the Path to the Next Normal series. This collection was assembled by Mike Borruso, Christopher Friedmann, Richard Johnson, Stephen Landau, Katie Shearer, Andrew Simon, Amanda Soto, Sarah Thuerk, and Nathan Wilson.

This page is just part of our full year-end series celebrating the best of McKinsey Global Publishing in 2022. See the full collection at 2022 year in review.