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Could this be explained in part by people who are good at math tending to make more money than people who are bad at math? http://media.collegeboard.com/digita

Could this be explained in part by people who are good at math tending to make more money than people who are bad at math? http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/research/2013/TotalGroup-2013.pdf http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/research/2...

mikegioia 12y ago
It has nothing to do with that. Wealth in this country is in no way correlated to math ability.
- nickff 12y ago
  Do you have any direct evidence of this? I ask because it is well known that math ability is correlated with educational achievement, and level of education is known to be correlated with income. Putting these two together, I would suppose that math ability is correlated with income.
  - mikegioia 12y ago
    I'm not saying that greater math ability doesn't correlate to greater wealth. That could very well be true (and it probably is). What I meant was that the public school system is funded by tax dollars. Wealthier neighborhoods contribute more tax money and have better public schools. I obviously don't have any direct evidence, but I would sat there's almost no correlation to wealthy neighborhoods and their residents being good at math. If you don't believe me, we could go knock on every door in my parents' neighborhood and ask them what they got on their SAT math section :P Joking aside, I'm basing that on the fact that not every high-paying job requires math skills, and not every rich person got rich because of math.
    - aurelian 12y ago
      Direct evidence against your belief: http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/research/2013/TotalGroup-2013.pdf http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/research/2...
      - mikegioia 12y ago
        What an annoying response. You link me an 18 page PDF and call it direct evidence? Did you even read what I said? I'm not arguing that greater math ability doesn't correlate to greater wealth! This issue boils down to wealthier neighborhoods getting more money to invest in better math education for their students. That's it! Are you claiming that all rich people are good at math? Or that only people good at math are rich? In your world, can there exist a neighborhood of wealthy people who are not good at math? I have no clue and frankly I'm done explaining myself here.
        aurelian 12y ago
        Your belief is wrong. All research on the subject tells us that spending has at most a small impact on test scores. I'd link you to PDFs but I know how you feel about that.
        esbranson 12y ago
        I think you're wrong, and that spending does have a huge impact on test scores; the PDF you link even supports that higher family income correlates with higher test scores. My argument assumes that wealthier families spend more than less wealthier ones.
        aurelian 12y ago
        The evidence is not on your side. http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/04/07/study-no-link-between-school-spending-student-achievement/ http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/04/07/study-no-link-betw... You can downvote me but you still have no evidence for your beliefs.
        esbranson 12y ago
        I actually can't downvote you. And I wouldn't. Downvoting without responding is cowardly, or at least not conducive to the aim of a civilized discussion. Its the Hacker News equivalent to anonymous hate mail. They are like rumors, and lead to distrust and aversion to frank debate, everything we should try and avoid. If someone downvotes a comment that is ultimately upvoted, the downvotes should be reassessed against themselves or something. If Wikipedia had such a mechanism the whole community would break down. Its a bad feature. School spending is not the only spending involved. A large cost, roughly equivalent to spending, of the family is that which is spent on providing a loving, supportive, positive, non-absent relationship within the family. This costs time away from work. This costs money cultivating relationships with intelligent people. This provides affluent children with more positive influences, positive role models, and less stress that lends to more focus on learning. They tend to invest more in their children, but its not to say that a wealthy family will invest as much as a poor family with more of a focus on education. The list goes on and on. Its not as if you need to be affluent to provide or invest in these things, its just more conducive.
    - esbranson 12y ago
      Well, I think you're hitting on something. 1. I think you're wrong about the lack of correlation and, as nickff points out, better math ability is correlated with higher income, but 2. Math ability does not affect income. Correlation is not causation. The better math ability is a side effect of higher income in my opinion, not vise-versa.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
psychometry 12y ago
If that's a component, it's a relatively insignificant one. Regression to the mean would likely take care of that advantage across generations.

mikegioia 12y ago

It has nothing to do with that. Wealth in this country is in no way correlated to math ability.

nickff 12y ago
Do you have any direct evidence of this? I ask because it is well known that math ability is correlated with educational achievement, and level of education is known to be correlated with income. Putting these two together, I would suppose that math ability is correlated with income.
- mikegioia 12y ago
  I'm not saying that greater math ability doesn't correlate to greater wealth. That could very well be true (and it probably is). What I meant was that the public school system is funded by tax dollars. Wealthier neighborhoods contribute more tax money and have better public schools. I obviously don't have any direct evidence, but I would sat there's almost no correlation to wealthy neighborhoods and their residents being good at math. If you don't believe me, we could go knock on every door in my parents' neighborhood and ask them what they got on their SAT math section :P Joking aside, I'm basing that on the fact that not every high-paying job requires math skills, and not every rich person got rich because of math.
  - aurelian 12y ago
    Direct evidence against your belief: http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/research/2013/TotalGroup-2013.pdf http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/research/2...
    - mikegioia 12y ago
      What an annoying response. You link me an 18 page PDF and call it direct evidence? Did you even read what I said? I'm not arguing that greater math ability doesn't correlate to greater wealth! This issue boils down to wealthier neighborhoods getting more money to invest in better math education for their students. That's it! Are you claiming that all rich people are good at math? Or that only people good at math are rich? In your world, can there exist a neighborhood of wealthy people who are not good at math? I have no clue and frankly I'm done explaining myself here.
      - aurelian 12y ago
        Your belief is wrong. All research on the subject tells us that spending has at most a small impact on test scores. I'd link you to PDFs but I know how you feel about that.
        esbranson 12y ago
        I think you're wrong, and that spending does have a huge impact on test scores; the PDF you link even supports that higher family income correlates with higher test scores. My argument assumes that wealthier families spend more than less wealthier ones.
        aurelian 12y ago
        The evidence is not on your side. http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/04/07/study-no-link-between-school-spending-student-achievement/ http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/04/07/study-no-link-betw... You can downvote me but you still have no evidence for your beliefs.
        esbranson 12y ago
        I actually can't downvote you. And I wouldn't. Downvoting without responding is cowardly, or at least not conducive to the aim of a civilized discussion. Its the Hacker News equivalent to anonymous hate mail. They are like rumors, and lead to distrust and aversion to frank debate, everything we should try and avoid. If someone downvotes a comment that is ultimately upvoted, the downvotes should be reassessed against themselves or something. If Wikipedia had such a mechanism the whole community would break down. Its a bad feature. School spending is not the only spending involved. A large cost, roughly equivalent to spending, of the family is that which is spent on providing a loving, supportive, positive, non-absent relationship within the family. This costs time away from work. This costs money cultivating relationships with intelligent people. This provides affluent children with more positive influences, positive role models, and less stress that lends to more focus on learning. They tend to invest more in their children, but its not to say that a wealthy family will invest as much as a poor family with more of a focus on education. The list goes on and on. Its not as if you need to be affluent to provide or invest in these things, its just more conducive.
  - esbranson 12y ago
    Well, I think you're hitting on something. 1. I think you're wrong about the lack of correlation and, as nickff points out, better math ability is correlated with higher income, but 2. Math ability does not affect income. Correlation is not causation. The better math ability is a side effect of higher income in my opinion, not vise-versa.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

psychometry 12y ago

If that's a component, it's a relatively insignificant one. Regression to the mean would likely take care of that advantage across generations.