These graphs are from the NYT.com. The top graph is very attractive, but it's not clear why spending is indicated by a continuous line that forms a spike, when there is not any variation within one variable on the x-axis. Plot points of vertical bars might have been less attractive, but they would have been more accurate.
I am also very confused by what the title of the bottom graph actually concludes from the data: "consumption spreads faster today." Consumption seems more spread, but the rate of the spread itself is not easy to see from the graphic.