This image is interesting but lacks any context (including what the asterisk is for which is what initially bugged me) so I searched and found the actual story

This image is interesting but lacks any context (including what the asterisk is for which is what initially bugged me) so I searched and found the actual story which has the graphic and explains what it means including that the asterisks indicates: "We used data from the Census Bureau, which has two catch-all categories: "managers not elsewhere classified" and "salespersons not elsewhere classified." Because those categories are broad and vague to the point of meaninglessness, we excluded them from our map." http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/02/05/382664837/map-the-most-common-job-in-every-state http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/02/05/382664837/map-t...