I came across an interesting website called WorldMapper. I’m kind of a map freak anyway, but this website puts a new spin on it. It has scores of maps that are modified to compare various information between countries by using their land area as the comparative variable. In other words, the appearance of the country on the map will be bigger or smaller depending on whether or not that country has a higher or lower score, respectively, for whatever we are comparing.
The map linked to the picture on the right is the full PDF file poster of the land area map. I know this sounds redundant, but most maps distort the land area because of the way they are projected… the bias is towards smaller equatorial land and larger polar land. That is why on most maps Greenland looks bigger than the entire United States and Antarctica looks like it could be bigger than all of Asia.
From the land area map they run their variable comparisons. Some of my favorites compare population today, population in the year 1 AD, immigration destination (no surprise here), toys exports, toys imports, medicines exports, and valuables imports.
These kinds of pictorial illustrations enthrall me… and they also buttress my argument that we in the States live in a big amusement park. So big and rich is our amusement park that we can stand inside a home… our home… with a market value that could probably feed 500 Africans for a decade. We’ll stand in our home of about 500-1500 square feet per person (including the dog)… and we’ll look outside our special thermally insulated bay window that probably cost more than a dozen Indian workers make in a month. We’ll look outside our window at our fleet of street-legal Sherman tanks sitting in the driveway… almost one per house occupant (including the toddler and the dog). We’ll look at our vehicles… and instead of being in wonder at how blessed we are we’ll mull over how gas prices are hitting us for another few bucks every week. Go figure.
Can you tell I live near some very affluent areas? 
I'm a Christ-follower, compelled by my faith toward reason, which points directly toward conservatism. This world's daily onslaught of lunacy offends my intellect and senses, so this is my venue to blow off steam.
The land mass size on a map is distorted away from the equator in rectangular maps because we try to project the surface of a sphere onto a two dimensional rectangle, the Mercator projection. That is the key reason why we see the Goode projection (amongst others); the interrupted projection commonly used for world maps. It reminds me of someone peeling the Earth and spreading the peel flat.
Yeah, the Mercator projection was always the worst one for size comparison because of the severe distortions at the top and bottom of the cylinder (rectangle).
The Albers projection is the one everyone associates with graphing plane travel and it’s pretty accurate for smaller maps.
And yes, the Goode projection is a great world map, but always reminded me of seventies TV news shows. (Also, I have an aversion to ‘Goode’)