Politics in Your Genes

Twin study shows political attitudes are somewhat heritable, more so environmental, but have little to do with upbringing:

To the extent that political ideologies are inherited and not learned, they become more difficult to manipulate. Conservative parents who try to make their children conservative by carefully controlling their children’s environments are probably overestimating the importance of those environments. Offspring of such parents are likely to end up being conservative but less because of the environment created by the parents than the genes passed along by the parents.

Did Toronto Really Break the Homicide Record?

While other news outlets are saying Toronto just broke homicide records, The CBC deserves credit for pointing out the difference between rates and instances:

Nearly half a million fewer people lived in Toronto back in 1991, so with 89 slayings the homicide rate was 3.9 per 100,000 residents. Right now it's 3.3 per 100,000 with the 90th homicide of the year.

#Everythingisawesomenobodyishappy

What is The Euphemism Treadmill?

Click here for a clear explanation of The Euphemism Treadmill, with lots of examples.

Do People like you more than You Think?

 New paper on The Liking Gap:

We found that following interactions, people systematically underestimated how much their conversation partners liked them and enjoyed their company

Spending, School Rankings and Performance

Why you can't argue spending increases school performance by citing school rankings that assume spending increases school performance

We fixed two serious problems common to traditional rankings. First, we removed factors that do not measure K–12 student performance or teaching effectiveness, such as spending per student (intentions to raise performance are not the same as raising performance), graduation rates (which often indicate nothing about learning, since 38 states do not have graduation proficiency exams), and pre-K enrollment. 

Rankings that include these factors distract from true student performance. For example, under traditional rankings, states with inferior test scores sometimes outrank states with better ones simply because they spend more. A June article in the Tampa Bay Times highlighted the role of spending in the state's position in one lineup: "Critics of Florida's public education funding system got another piece of ammunition Wednesday, as Education Week rated the state's school spending an F alongside 25 other states."

Intellectual Idols

Bryan Caplan is against veneration. Why?

First, the standard idols just seem overrated...

Second, lobbying on the idols’ behalf seems overrated as well

and

But, you may ask, where’s the harm in veneration? Above all else, veneration taxes the search for truth. Once you idolize a thinker, it’s hard to calmly weigh his arguments. Perverse nepotism sets in: “Take heed lest a statue crush you!” Don’t believe me? Imagine if I randomly inserted some trite words into the works of whatever thinker you most venerate. Wouldn’t you be sorely tempted, by hook or by crook, to spin my forgery as yet another expression of your idol’s genius?

What Causes Racial Disparities?

Read over Wikipedia's List of ethnic groups in the United States by household income:

Rank	Race	Median household income (2018 US$)
1	Asian	80,720[1]
2	White	61,349[1]
3	All households	57,617[1]
4	Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander	57,112[1]
5	Hispanic or Latino (of any race)	46,882[1]
6	Some other race	44,798[1]
7	American Indian and Alaska Native	39,719[1]
8	Black or African American	38,555[1]

1. Indian American (2016) : $122,026 ^[2]
2. Jewish American (2016) : $100,059 ^[3]
3. Australian American (2016) : $91,452 ^[3]
4. Taiwanese American (2016) : $90,221 ^[3]
5. Filipino American (2016) : $88,745 ^[2]
6. British American (2016) : $79,872^[3]
7. Austrian American (2016) : $78,127^[3]
8. Russian American (2016): $77,841 (2014)^[3]
9. Latvian American (2016): $77,636^[3]
10. Bulgarian American (2016): $76,861^[3]
11. Lithuanian American (2016) : $76,694^[3]
12. Israeli American (2016) : $76,584 ^[3]
13. Slovene American (2016) : $75,940^[3]
14. Lebanese American (2016): $75,337^[3]
15. Croatian American (2016): $73,991^[3]
16. Sri Lankan American: $73,856^[3]
17. Scandinavian American (2016): $73,797^[3]
18. Chinese American (2016): $73,788^[2]
    (including Taiwanese American)
19. Belgian American (2016) : $73,443^[3]
20. Chinese American (2016): $72,827^[2]
    (excluding Taiwanese American)
21. Swiss American (2016) : $72,823^[3]
22. Iranian American (2016) : $72,733^[3]
23. Italian American (2016) : $72,586^[3]
24. Ukrainian American (2016): $72,449 ^[3]
25. Romanian American (2016): $72,381^[3]
26. Greek American (2016): $72,291^[3]
27. Scottish American (2016): $71,925^[3]
28. Danish American (2016) : $71,550^[3]
29. Swedish American (2016): $71,217 ^[3]
30. Polish American (2016): $71,172^[3]
31. Slavic American (2016) : $71,163^[3]
32. Norwegian American (2016): $71,142^[3]
33. Canadian American (2016) : $70,809^[3]
34. Welsh American (2016): $70,351^[3]
35. Japanese American : $70,261^[4]
36. Czech American (2016) : $70,454^[3]
37. Czechslovakian American (2016) : $70,084^[3]
38. Finnish American (2016) : $70,045^[3]
39. Serbian American (2016) : $70,028^[3]
40. Hungarian American (2016): $69,515^[3]
41. French Canadian American (2016) : $68,075^[3]
42. Portuguese American (2016): $67,807^[3]
43. Vietnamese American : $67,800^[5]
    (excluding Foreign Born)
44. English American (2016) : $67,663^[3]
45. Slovak American (2016) : $67,471^[3]
46. Armenian American (2016): $67,450^[3]
47. German American (2016): $67,306^[3]
48. Korean American : $66,737^[2]
49. Irish American (2016) : $66,688^[3]
50. Ghanaian American (2016): $66,571^[3]
51. Turkish American (2016) : $66,566^[3]
52. Palestinian American (2016): $65,170^[3]
53. Egyptian American (2016) : $64,728^[3]
54. Vietnamese American : $64,191^[6]
55. Scotch-Irish American (2016) : $64,187^[3]
56. Yugoslavian American (2016) : $63,765^[3]
57. Dutch American (2016) : $63,597^[3]
58. French American (2016) : $63,471^[3]
59. Syrian American (2016): $63,096^[3]
60. Pakistani American : $62,848^[4][7]
61. Albanian American (2016) : $62,624^[3]
62. Indonesian American : $61,943^[4]
63. Guyanese American (2016) : $60,968^[3]
64. Nigerian American (2016): $60,732^[3]
65. British West Indian American (2016): $60,407^[3]
66. Vietnamese American : $58,700^[8]
    (Foreign Born)
67. Cuban American : $57,000^[9]
68. West Indian American : $56,998^[3]
69. Brazilian American (2016): $56,151^[3]
70. Barbadian American : $56,078^[3]
71. Argentine American: $55,000^[10]
72. Laotian American : $53,655^[4]
73. Thai American : $53,468^[4]
74. Cambodian American : $53,359^[4]
75. Cajun American : $52,886^[3]
76. Jamaican American (2016): $52,669^[3]
77. Trinidadian and Tobagonian American : $55,303^[3]
78. Moroccan American (2016) : $52,436^[3]
79. Peruvian Americans : $52,000^[3]
80. American (2016): $51,601^[3]
81. Jordanian American (2016): $51,552^[3]
82. Pennsylvania German American (2016): $48,955^[3]
83. Ecuadorian American : $49,000^[3]
84. Hmong American : $48,149^[4]
85. Colombian American : $48,000^[10]
86. Haitian American (2016): $47,990^[3]
87. Cape Verdean American (2016) : $47,281^[3]
88. Assyrian/Chaldean/Syriac American (2016): $44,733^[3]
89. Nepali American : $44,677^[4]
90. Bangladeshi American : $44,512^[4]
91. Afghan American : $43,838^[3]
92. Arab American (2016): $42,204^[3]
93. Bahamian American : $42,000^[3]
94. Ethiopian American (2016) : $41,357^[3]
95. Puerto Rican American : $40,000^[10]
96. Mexican American : $38,000^[10]
97. Burmese American : $35,016^[4]
98. African American : $34,600^[11]
99. Iraqi American (2016) : $32,818^[3]
100. Dominican American : $32,300^[10]
101. Honduran American: $31,000^[10]
102. Somali American (2016): $24,185^[3]
103. Salvadoran American : $20,800^[9]

This is evidence Coleman Hughes cites against what he calls The Disparity Fallacy.

The disparity fallacy holds that unequal outcomes between two groups must be caused primarily by discrimination, whether overt or systemic.

It is funny to think Americans forgot to be racist against Indians or Nigerians, who both have median incomes above the average.

Coleman Hughes' essay is called, The Racism Treadmill