Asian men consistently outearn all other racial groups. By a lot.

[Latimer]

Very interesting piece by Malcolm Gladwell in The New Yorker on ethnicity, culture, class and I.Q:

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/12/17/none-of-the-above

 

[refujiunderground]

Latimer Rd further showing his bigotry and prejudice. This is what happens when you pride brawn over brain.

 

[Latimer]

^
That the ethnicity list in my post #40 is detailed enough to include both Welsh Americans and Hmong Americans but neglects to provide any data on Latin Americans other than Brazilian Americans gives me pause...

 

[Latimer]

Simply say who you mean as OP

I posted an article based on a Pew study. It wasn't my study and "Asian" was their choice of words, not mine--and although "Asian" was left undefined in the article, I assumed the Middle East and the Asian portions of the former Soviet Union were excluded from the category. I am aware that Asian thus defined includes populations as different as the Ainus in Japan and the Parsis in India.


As I grew up in, and was primarily educated in California, I assumed that any list would be dominated by Confucian-influenced ethnicities (Chinese, Korean, Japanese, etc.) along with Indians. I have worked with, and have friendships with Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese and Indian Americans; a Korean national and a Japanese national have been important mentors to me. Very important mentors. Based those experiences, I was not surprised to read that "Asian men...outearn...other racial groups." I was surprised to find Japanese and Korean Americans were lower on the list, and Filipino Americans higher. (Confirmation bias led me astray.)

A Jewish physician friend, commenting on the great number of Asian (his word) doctors in the US said, "Asians are the new Jews."
He then added that becoming a doctor was the best way of elevating your status in one generation. His first generation Jewish American father had done it; his first generation Chinese American colleague was doing the same thing. He hoped at least one of his children would follow him into medicine, but figured they'd take the easier and more lucrative path into banking or law.

 

[Latimer]

...you pride brawn over brain.

http://ancientolympics.arts.kuleuven.be/eng/TE010EN.html

I'm amused you think that. I like to think I'm pretty balanced in that regard.

You really should read the New Yorker article closely. I learned a lot. I fail to find any bigotry or prejudice in Gladwell's reporting.

 

[evanrick]

Its not a cultural phenomenon is an economic one.

People with greater skills are going to move to America. if they suddenly all funnel in over the course of a couple decades and come from countries that vastly outnumber the native population of older generation Americans of course they will be over-represented in economic statistics.

not to mention American corporations love hiring foreign workers to work for them because they can pay them less and never spend a dime supporting the schools that educate domestic labor. Its a win-win for corporate America, lower tax bills, lower labor costs for higher skilled jobs, and unfortunately its at the expense of all other Americans in the form of lower wages and lessened opportunities, not to mention continuing tax subsidies to 'create jobs here' that can be moved to another country at any time when these entities decide to participate in corporate couch surfing.

nevermind that businesses that cannot function without domestic locations pay higher taxes than ones that can operate internationally with few restrictions on what they import or what tax loopholes they can exploit, that few domestic businesses would ever come close to having the clout in order to take advantages of those give-aways.

It also sends a message to other corporations and individuals that you can socialize the political, economic and cultural debts to the society that make your business possible that selfisness is an means to an end.

But these are minor details, as long as we continue to transfer wealth and power to these faceless corporate entities that have fewer and fewer loyalties to America, the greater their chances of escaping corporate accountability become and the harder it becomes for us to stop them.

but please please dont let this cold slap of reality get in the way of this wonderful pseudo-intellectual discussion.

 

[NotHardUp1]

A Jewish physician friend, commenting on the great number of Asian (his word) doctors in the US said, "Asians are the new Jews."
He then added that becoming a doctor was the best way of elevating your status in one generation. His first generation Jewish American father had done it; his first generation Chinese American colleague was doing the same thing. He hoped at least one of his children would follow him into medicine, but figured they'd take the easier and more lucrative path into banking or law.

It's a matter of culture, language, and valuing education. Latino and African and East European immigrants may be slower as cultures to embrace English and high language skill as an avenue to economic success. Likewise, they may not engender the same hard study ethic in their children, and watch them fall dramatically behind their Indian, Malay, Chinese, Japanese, and Pakistani classmates in US schools.

Those are not rules by any means, but they sure are demographic patterns.

It's not just that the so-called "Asians" are working harder, but they're working smarter, no doubt about it.

 

[kallipolis]

It is noteworthy that the current POTUS is an African American.

The beginning of wisdom is knowing that we all have much to learn, and that homo sapiens first emerged in East Africa.

 

[kallipolis]

http://ancientolympics.arts.kuleuven.be/eng/TE010EN.html

I'm amused you think that. I like to think I'm pretty balanced in that regard.

You really should read the New Yorker article closely. I learned a lot. I fail to find any bigotry or prejudice in Gladwell's reporting.

I confirm that I read the article despite not being particularly influenced by IQ fundamentalists spouting their claims.

The cited New Yorker article clearly evidences that IQ does not depend upon ones ethnicity. Furthermore IQ is never the measure of common sense, or of wisdom that evidences ones "success" journeying through life.

Here in Greece, Asia begins in Turkey.

 

[peeonme]

I wonder if nutrition during gestation along with the early cognitive forming years has more to do with any variations amongst ethnic groups when it come to IQ ranges.

Along with this you have people from one culture designing a test to measure the IQ of another culture.

 

[zombiekiller]

I wonder if nutrition during gestation along with the early cognitive forming years has more to do with any variations amongst ethnic groups when it come to IQ ranges.

Along with this you have people from one culture designing a test to measure the IQ of another culture.

This reminds me of those tests I had to take back in elementary, middle, and high schools. I couldn't speak much English back in elementary and middle schools, so I'm pretty sure they labeled me as "retarded" considering I always filled in random bubbles.

In high school, I was able to read those tests just fine. But I found that the questions were too... culturally based. I found myself having a lot of hard time understanding those reading and writing questions.

I scored pretty low on those tests and I turned out alright.

Recently, there have been many studies that show test scores and GPA's have absolutely no correlation with job performance. This is why more and more companies have stopped asking for GPA's. My company, for example, doesn't even mention it.

 

[Latimer]

It is noteworthy that the current POTUS is an African American.

It is noteworthy that the current POTUS had no relationship with Black American culture until he chose to, and it is doubtful that his African father had any relationship with Black American culture when he lived in the US attending the University of Hawaii and Harvard University. It was at the former that he met the President's white mother. In any case, the president was 1 year old when his parents divorced, and his mother later married a Javanese. From ages 6 to 10 he lived in Indonesia, after which he was sent back to Hawaii to live with his maternal grandparents, and where he attended the best private school on the islands. I gather from what he has written, that the only stable influence in his younger years was that of his white American grandparents. I read once that he has stated that he chose to identify with Black America because the larger culture identified him as a Black American.




http://www.npr.org/2011/07/11/137553552/president-obamas-father-a-bold-and-reckless-life

 

[kallipolis]

Your comment confirms the main thrust of the New Yorker article that ones IQ is not determined by ones ethnicity.

That an African American is POTUS helps us appreciate this fact of life.

 

[KaraBulut]

It is noteworthy that the current POTUS is an African American.

It is noteworthy that the current POTUS had no relationship with Black American culture until he chose to, and it is doubtful that his African father had any relationship with Black American culture....I read once that he has stated that he chose to identify with Black America because the larger culture identified him as a Black American.

African American is such an archaic term, although in this case it would be fair to say that Obama is either biracial or the son of an Kenyan man.

Can someone define exactly what "Black American culture" is?

One would guess that Obama associated himself with the Black community when he met Michelle Robinson and married her. Although Michelle is also biracial and her childhood was decidedly middle class.

These things don't really fit into the tidy little boxes that everyone expects them to.

I wonder if nutrition during gestation along with the early cognitive forming years has more to do with any variations amongst ethnic groups when it come to IQ ranges.

Along with this you have people from one culture designing a test to measure the IQ of another culture.

Nutrition is a big factor in the third world but not as much in the US- at least not in present day North America where protein sources are abundant. There are factors like lead poisoning that are at play in children who grow up in impoverished areas in North America.

There are other factors- the age of the mother, the education level of the parents and the amount of education that occurs during the developing years. Expectations play a big part in the overall picture.

 

[xbuzzerx]

Along with this you have people from one culture designing a test to measure the IQ of another culture.

That one's huge.

I remember two stories my professor told about IQ tests and cultural anthropology.

One was a question asking you to exclude the item that did not belong with the others. The choices were pencil, hammer, axe, nail (or something like that.) Westerners were expected, and usually, chose pencil because it's something you write with and not a construction tool like the others. Non western cultures, particularly less developed ones, would choose nail... because you don't use any wood to make it.

Perfectly logical, correct answer. But not the one the test designers anticipated anyone giving.

Another was a cultural anthropologist attempting to give an IQ test to a tribal culture in Africa. Everytime the individual taking the test would get stumped, he would get up, take the test with him and go over and discuss the problem with a group of other men. The anthropologist ran over and told him, you can't talk to other people, you have to try to solve the problem and answer it without help. And the test taker responded, "but this is how we come up with answers to problems."

 

[kallipolis]

^^The fundamental issue here is that ones ethnicity is not the determining factor for ones IQ.

African American is such an archaic term, although in this case it would be fair to say that Obama is either biracial or the son of an Kenyan man.

We can agree.

Nevertheless it is a convenient label, much like gay...that attempts to address society's obsessiveness with pigeon holing people into categories. Making for easy recognition, so to speak.

 

[xbuzzerx]

It is noteworthy that the current POTUS had no relationship with Black American culture until he chose to, and it is doubtful that his African father had any relationship with Black American culture when he lived in the US attending the University of Hawaii and Harvard University.

The completely unquestioned assumption underlining your statements here is that there is one monolithic "Black American culture" which excludes all immigrant experiences, mixed-race people or people with immigrant parents from other countries, and that Obama was not part of this culture and only somehow "falsely embraced it" for political gain or whatever else.

Besides, I can assure you that no matter what Obama, himself, personally in his head "thought" of his culture as being... the vast majority of Americans around him for the vast majority of his life automatically consigned him to blackness, with no distinction made for the fact that his father was a Kenyan immigrant or that his mother was white.

So I really don't see your point, at all. I just see it as a petty little attack on his identity.

 

[peeonme]

That one's huge.

I remember two stories my professor told about IQ tests and cultural anthropology.

Another was a cultural anthropologist attempting to give an IQ test to a tribal culture in Africa. Everytime the individual taking the test would get stumped, he would get up, take the test with him and go over and discuss the problem with a group of other men. The anthropologist ran over and told him, you can't talk to other people, you have to try to solve the problem and answer it without help. And the test taker responded, "but this is how we come up with answers to problems."

This is quite interesting, I noticed yesterday at the SOS office when I was waiting to transfer a car title that I was surrounded by about three different languages, I think that they were Arabic, Spanish and some eastern European or Slavic type of language.
All 3 groups broke back and forth between their home language and some English.

What I found to be different than what I see from Americans was that when their number was called to go to the counter the whole family of each group went together, it seemed as though if one had something to work out, they all had something to work out.

There were it seemed about 3 generations from each group, no one from America that I know of takes grandma with him, anyplace.

 

[Kahaih]

This is quite interesting, I noticed yesterday at the SOS office when I was waiting to transfer a car title that I was surrounded by about three different languages, I think that they were Arabic, Spanish and some eastern European or Slavic type of language.
All 3 groups broke back and forth between their home language and some English.

What I found to be different than what I see from Americans was that when their number was called to go to the counter the whole family of each group went together, it seemed as though if one had something to work out, they all had something to work out.

There were it seemed about 3 generations from each group, no one from America that I know of takes grandma with him, anyplace.

That's fucking hilarious – and not in a 'with you' kind of way.

 

[Harke the Boeotarch]

That one's huge.

I remember two stories my professor told about IQ tests and cultural anthropology.

One was a question asking you to exclude the item that did not belong with the others. The choices were pencil, hammer, axe, nail (or something like that.) Westerners were expected, and usually, chose pencil because it's something you write with and not a construction tool like the others. Non western cultures, particularly less developed ones, would choose nail... because you don't use any wood to make it.

Perfectly logical, correct answer. But not the one the test designers anticipated anyone giving.

Another was a cultural anthropologist attempting to give an IQ test to a tribal culture in Africa. Everytime the individual taking the test would get stumped, he would get up, take the test with him and go over and discuss the problem with a group of other men. The anthropologist ran over and told him, you can't talk to other people, you have to try to solve the problem and answer it without help. And the test taker responded, "but this is how we come up with answers to problems."

Anthropologists are girlies. Even the men. Especially the men.

Please just go write some soft science fiction or something (if you're an anthropologist).