Comments on: IQ By State

by: Jemima

Sun, 23 May 2004 18:25:12 +0000

I saw that, but it would be nice to do a rough conversion between the test scores and IQ. I found your inclusion of the hoax IQ’s in the table confusing.

by: Van Sloan

Sun, 23 May 2004 01:08:11 +0000

I agree that the hoax data may not be all false. My page http://SQ.4mg.com/schools.htm uses 4th grade test scores to rank state IQ. The result is the most believable to date, with the lowest scores for the District of Columbia, the deep South, and states with large percentages of Latino immigrants.

by: Jemima

Tue, 11 May 2004 03:17:14 +0000

I considered high school graduation rates (available at the same URL) but decided against them because high school attendance is mandatory while college is voluntary, and it’s more common to pass students for social or political reasons in high school than in college. But the reasons you mentioned probably swamp mine, as far as ranking the states goes. The most accurate approach would be to rank by county or district, but I’m not about to assemble those figures.

I don’t think the 18% figure is far off - it’s well known that voting (at all) is correlated with education, only 50% or so of Americans vote, and (same citation as above) about 9% of the US population has post-graduate degrees. In other words, it’s still the elite wing of the Democratic party carrying the liberal states, even though the high school dropouts (20% of the US population but only 5% of voters) tend to vote Democrat as well.

by: Steve Sailer

Mon, 10 May 2004 04:28:06 +0000

Thanks for the college data. The problem with looking at college graduate percentages is that it doesn’t represent the average for the state, just the size of the educated elite. For example, California ranks high in % of college grads but it’s also #1 in percentage of resident who have never even attended high school.

Liberal states like California and New York tend to be more unequal than conservative states like Utah and Kansas.

It can be approached more directly by looking at national exit poll data of voters:

In terms of education and party voting, there existed in 2000 a U shaped pattern, with Gore doing best with the least and most educated.�

Vote by Education

No H.S. Degree
5% % of total voters
59% Voted for Gore
39% Voted for Bush
High School Graduate
21% % of total voters
48% Voted for Gore
49% Voted for Bush
Some College
32% % of total voters
45% Voted for Gore
51% Voted for Bush
College Graduate
24% % of total voters
45% Voted for Gore
51% Voted for Bush
Post-Graduate Degree
18% % of total voters
52% Voted for Gore
44% Voted for Bush

This comes from the Voter News Service exit poll of 13,000 voters.�

A couple of caveats: First, people exaggerate their education. It’s unlikely that 18% of voters actually had graduate degrees. Second, a large fraction of Gore’s votes from Graduate Degree holders came from schoolteachers, and many don’t consider Ed School masters and doctorates to be in the same class in terms of mental demands as other advanced degrees.

by: Gene Expression

Sun, 09 May 2004 21:24:56 +0000

The great “IQ hoax”
Steve Sailer has a full round-up over at his site. Readers of Lefty blogs should spread the word so that this false meme is counteracted…. Update: Speak Stiltedly and Wear a Yellow Short has a post that ranks % of…