The University of New Hampshire has launched a new site that allows you to quickly compare population and demographic factors across regions of the country instead of state-by-state. The Regional Indicators site is available at http://regionalindicators.unh.edu; it uses data from the Census Bureau and the Bureau of Economic Statistics.

From the front page choose “Indicators for Regions,” and you’ll be given a map of the US divided into regions and a list of indicators you can choose from, including population, employment, kids and income level.

Choose an indicator (each indicator has several sub-indicators) and the page will refresh with indicators placed over every region. Many of them are divided out into metro and non-metro areas.

If you don’t want the information in map format, or you want to see more detail, choose the “View Data Table” option, which will give you the information both in percentage and raw numbers. Further, you’ll get statistics for the United States as a whole. Further, you can also print the map (a new page will open with just the map, which you can print) or download the data available in a comma-delimited text file.

Nicely done, though I didn’t realize how much I had gotten used to Google Map-type layouts until I found myself wishing I could zoom in on a static map. I wonder how many indicators you could map to a site like this?