The first graph establishes that there is no clear trend or clustering in the data points. The second one lets you visualize just how many years are around the 10% average or not, and then the argument is expanded from there.

They seem to serve their purpose pretty well. There's probably a nicer way to display that, and maybe combine them as one of Tufte's principles would suggest, but I don't see anything that would make him weep here :) What do you have in mind?