You say that like some of the most educated people in the country don’t consistently vote Republican.
This idea that earning a MBA or a JD or an MD makes your politics good is completely wrong. The idea that failing to earn a HS Diploma makes you unqualified to vote is equally dogshit.
Politics is a consequence of your social affinity and your material conditions. You don’t just take a class and become a liberal Democrat if your grade is high enough.
This idea that earning a MBA or a JD or an MD makes your politics good is completely wrong
Well, on average… it does.
You don’t just take a class and become a liberal Democrat if your grade is high enough.
No, but being intelligent is correlated with both of these things. Dumb people are more easily tricked by right wing talking points. Dumb people also don’t get good grades. Smart people are, for whatever reason, more likely to agree with liberal or leftist talking points. Smart people are also more likely to get high grades.
Average. On average, people with degrees are more liberal/leftist. As a group. Separate the degrees from the non-degrees, and measure their liberalism/leftism, and find which group has the higher average. Average.
On average, people with degrees are more liberal/leftist.
On average, liberal neighborhoods and counties have more educated people.
Go into a red neighborhood, and the math changes. Mormons break 70 R / 22 D / 8 I for candidates while enjoying a 36% bachelor completion rate - 3pts higher than the national average.
Hindus break 46 D / 49 R and have a staggering 70pt college competition rate.
Meanwhile, historically black Protestants have a meager 24pt college rate, but regularly vote 80/20 Democrat.
No, it actually doesn’t. Within a Mormon community, I would wager we would still see that the most educated Mormons are also, ON AVERAGE, the most liberal/leftist Mormons.
Sure, if this is the only thing you knew, there could be a Simpson’s paradox situation, but we already know what the data looks like when we count everyone as one big group. Your “exceptions” can be true, and at the same time, are not evidence against the original claim. Even IF you found that, within EVERY group, education correlates with conservatism… it would just be Simpson’s paradox, because we already know that, on the whole, education is correlated to liberal/leftist attitudes.
Within a Mormon community, I would wager we would still see that the most educated Mormons are also, ON AVERAGE, the most liberal/leftist Mormons.
You’re welcome to check. But we can see very definitively that a higher-than-average rate of education does nothing to increase the partisan character of the voting block.
we already know what the data looks like when we count everyone
We know that we have an overall liberal voting demographic that is unevenly distributed across the country.
But we also know that age, industry, ethnicity/culture, and region play bigger factors in your voting habits than degree of education. We can even see shifts in voting trends over time within the same voter cohort. The trend you’re looking for is temporary at best, and highly contingent on the state, the school, and the field of study.
When you take broad averages like this, you very often lose useful information. In this case, just being “educated” in the abstract carries a weak correlation to political beliefs.
But we can see very definitively that a higher-than-average rate of education does nothing to increase the partisan character of the voting block.
Mormons have more bachelor degrees than average: Yes.
Mormons are more conservative than average: Yes.
We can see very definitively that a higher-than-average rate of education does nothing to increase the partisan character of the voting block: No.
That’s not what this shows. The two facts, together, are not enough to show a correlation between education and conservatism or to show a lack of correlation between education and liberal/leftist attitudes. To make a claim about correlation, as you are trying to do, you have two options:
Show a correlation or lack of correlation within this block,
Show a correlation or lack of correlation between average education level and average political leanings, using voting blocks as data points.
I have a perfect analogy:
I claim that smoking will decrease your life expectancy.
You claim that the smoking rate in the United States is 9.6%. The smoking rate in Japan is 16.4%. Life Expectancy in the United States is 79.8. Life Expectancy in Japan is 85.2. Therefore “we can see very definitively that a higher rate of smoking does nothing to decrease the life expectancy of the country”.
No. That doesn’t show that. Because if you look at data within Japan, you will still see a lower life expectancy among the people who smoke, and if you look at data globally, using countries as data points, you will also see lower life expectancy among the countries that smoke the most.
When you take broad averages like this, you very often lose useful information. In this case, just being “educated” in the abstract carries a weak correlation to political beliefs.
That’s true, but unfortunately, once you started trying to create a more complex model, you started making mistakes. And you aren’t even an idiot. Imagine your dumbest neighbors trying to make sense of this conversation.
No. I start off by giving you one variable correlated with one other variable. Once someone understands that, THEN we can start talking about nuance.
What does Japan have that America lacks, which might give them better long term health outcomes and a higher life expectancy?
Therefore “we can see very definitively that a higher rate of smoking does nothing to decrease the life expectancy of the country”.
Not relative to a public universal health care system, no.
If your diagnosis is “we need to cut cigarette use to save lives”, but we’re ignoring the very successful early medical interventions against cancer that save lives, then we’ve traded actual useful policy for This One Neat Trick that clearly doesn’t deliver the intended results.
You say that like some of the most educated people in the country don’t consistently vote Republican.
This idea that earning a MBA or a JD or an MD makes your politics good is completely wrong. The idea that failing to earn a HS Diploma makes you unqualified to vote is equally dogshit.
Politics is a consequence of your social affinity and your material conditions. You don’t just take a class and become a liberal Democrat if your grade is high enough.
Well, on average… it does.
No, but being intelligent is correlated with both of these things. Dumb people are more easily tricked by right wing talking points. Dumb people also don’t get good grades. Smart people are, for whatever reason, more likely to agree with liberal or leftist talking points. Smart people are also more likely to get high grades.
The Republican majority in Congress, the SCOTUS, and the White House all have advanced degrees.
Average. On average, people with degrees are more liberal/leftist. As a group. Separate the degrees from the non-degrees, and measure their liberalism/leftism, and find which group has the higher average. Average.
Average.
On average, liberal neighborhoods and counties have more educated people.
Go into a red neighborhood, and the math changes. Mormons break 70 R / 22 D / 8 I for candidates while enjoying a 36% bachelor completion rate - 3pts higher than the national average.
Hindus break 46 D / 49 R and have a staggering 70pt college competition rate.
Meanwhile, historically black Protestants have a meager 24pt college rate, but regularly vote 80/20 Democrat.
No, it actually doesn’t. Within a Mormon community, I would wager we would still see that the most educated Mormons are also, ON AVERAGE, the most liberal/leftist Mormons.
Sure, if this is the only thing you knew, there could be a Simpson’s paradox situation, but we already know what the data looks like when we count everyone as one big group. Your “exceptions” can be true, and at the same time, are not evidence against the original claim. Even IF you found that, within EVERY group, education correlates with conservatism… it would just be Simpson’s paradox, because we already know that, on the whole, education is correlated to liberal/leftist attitudes.
You’re welcome to check. But we can see very definitively that a higher-than-average rate of education does nothing to increase the partisan character of the voting block.
We know that we have an overall liberal voting demographic that is unevenly distributed across the country.
But we also know that age, industry, ethnicity/culture, and region play bigger factors in your voting habits than degree of education. We can even see shifts in voting trends over time within the same voter cohort. The trend you’re looking for is temporary at best, and highly contingent on the state, the school, and the field of study.
When you take broad averages like this, you very often lose useful information. In this case, just being “educated” in the abstract carries a weak correlation to political beliefs.
Mormons have more bachelor degrees than average: Yes.
Mormons are more conservative than average: Yes.
We can see very definitively that a higher-than-average rate of education does nothing to increase the partisan character of the voting block: No.
That’s not what this shows. The two facts, together, are not enough to show a correlation between education and conservatism or to show a lack of correlation between education and liberal/leftist attitudes. To make a claim about correlation, as you are trying to do, you have two options:
I have a perfect analogy:
I claim that smoking will decrease your life expectancy.
You claim that the smoking rate in the United States is 9.6%. The smoking rate in Japan is 16.4%. Life Expectancy in the United States is 79.8. Life Expectancy in Japan is 85.2. Therefore “we can see very definitively that a higher rate of smoking does nothing to decrease the life expectancy of the country”.
No. That doesn’t show that. Because if you look at data within Japan, you will still see a lower life expectancy among the people who smoke, and if you look at data globally, using countries as data points, you will also see lower life expectancy among the countries that smoke the most.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/smoking-rates-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/life-expectancy-by-country
That’s true, but unfortunately, once you started trying to create a more complex model, you started making mistakes. And you aren’t even an idiot. Imagine your dumbest neighbors trying to make sense of this conversation.
No. I start off by giving you one variable correlated with one other variable. Once someone understands that, THEN we can start talking about nuance.
What does Japan have that America lacks, which might give them better long term health outcomes and a higher life expectancy?
Not relative to a public universal health care system, no.
If your diagnosis is “we need to cut cigarette use to save lives”, but we’re ignoring the very successful early medical interventions against cancer that save lives, then we’ve traded actual useful policy for This One Neat Trick that clearly doesn’t deliver the intended results.