Humanities & Social ScienceThoughts on educational attainment and voting patterns at the state level:
The percentage of a state's population with a bachelor's-plus does not correlate nearly as strongly with estimated IQ scores based on NAEP data (.46) as the percentage of a state's population with less than a high school education (.72) does. The prolish behavior HS detests might be better indicated by the less than high school percentage than by the bachelor-plus number, depending on where the cutoff is*. Both measures include similar proportions of the population (19.6% of the population over 25 years of age has less than a high school diploma, while 24.4% has a bachelor's-plus).Taking the bachelor-plus percentage by state, subtracting the less than high school education percentage from it, and multiplying by 100 for ease of viewing, creates a simple educational attainment index by state that more fully accounts for not just the right side of a state's educational distribution, but the entire thing:
1. Colorado -- 19.6
2. Massachusetts -- 18.0
3. New Hampshire -- 16.1
4. Vermont -- 15.8
5. Connecticut -- 15.4...
46. Louisiana -- (6.5)
47. Arkansas -- (8.0)
48. Kentucky -- (8.8)
49. West Virginia -- (10.0)
50. Mississippi -- (10.2)
To see the full list, read the whole thing. Do remember though that between state trends do not necessarily translate into within state trends. Even within state trends do not translate to locality level trends. Consider the fact that the Democratic areas of New York state are the wealthiest on a coarse scale, but within Manhattan the more Republican precincts are in the wealthiest district (the Upper East Side).
Related: Conservatives are as smart as liberals.
Comments
At the blog post they mentioned many things (including some comments on Mormon emphasis on education to explain its score). However I don't think that's the main trend. Rather I think it's a regional thing. You have the northeast with a traditional emphasis on education. You have the south with poor schools and frankly poor emphasis on education. (I used to live in Louisiana and Mississippi so I think I can say that with fair experience) You then have the mountain west (Colorado, Utah, Montana) with an emphasis on education. The one outlier in the mountain region is Idaho. There's also Arizona and New Mexico but there you tend to have two large cultures so there is probably competing social trends in terms of emphasis on education.
Posted by: Clark | September 12, 2008 12:09 PM
I think the index conflates two different populations in the various states, people who were educated there, and people who live there now. Colorado (where I used to live) benefits from a high in-migration rate of college graduates drawn by high-tech industries and attractive surroundings. But it also has a large Hispanic population with high high school dropout rates.
Posted by: Linda Seebach | September 13, 2008 1:28 PM
Colorado (where I used to live) benefits from a high in-migration rate of college graduates drawn by high-tech industries and attractive surroundings. But it also has a large Hispanic population with high high school dropout rates.
that was the point to some extent. subtracting bachelor's from high school drop out is supposed to measure both tails.
Posted by: razib | September 13, 2008 1:43 PM
There is always the issue of honesty / character / ethics also. When I see a rich liberal I always think "liar".
For there is no law against giving it away.
And for instance another line of reasoning says liberals are supposed to be enlightened peaceniks yet they by an large are the ones most likely to get up in your face spraying saliva as they shout you down if you express a dissinterest in their global warming religion.
Posted by: Freemon Sandlewould | September 14, 2008 9:23 AM