Statistics and Context
Lies, damned lies, and statistics. Well, what about damned statistics that are meant to mislead people into incorrect conclusions?
I happened upon a passage in this weekend’s Parade Magazine that made me nearly foam at the mouth. The piece was challenging the notion that the United States was the “World’s Richest Nation,” as though everyone really believed it was anyway. There are countries with a higher median household income, and even a higher per-capita GDP! (Gasp. Let’s all give up and eat cheese.)
This is the paragraph that got me boiling:
Income inequality also is greater in the U.S. than in other developed nations, and some economists believe that makes us more vulnerable to hitting the skids than the rest of the world. “Low-wealth children are unlikely to become high-wealth adults, while high-wealth children are very likely to become high-wealth adults,” says Dalton Conley of the Center for American Progress, a Washington think tank. “That should sound alarms for policymakers.”
Alarms? I’ll tell you what alarms me…
- Why is it assumed that income inequality is a bad thing? Incomes are equal in undeveloped socialist states. “The trees were all kept equal with hatchet, axe and saw.” Income inequality can be a sign that varying levels of input (sweat and brains) will give you varying levels of results.
- “Some” economists. Really? Who? Let’s get more stringent with that attribution. I’ll bet there are “some” economists who think the earth is flat, or who think we faked the moon landing.
- Poverty is relative. A child born into a family on the U.S. poverty line has a standard of living (nutrition, air conditioning, square footage of abode, etc.) that is equal to the average European.
- “Low-wealth children are unlikely to become high-wealth adults.” This, on its face is true. Nowhere on the planet are low-wealth children likely to become high-wealth adults. That is not unique to the United States, nor to capitalist democracies.
- The Center for American Progress is a think tank – and “think tanks” are usually in the tank for whichever ideology is footing the bill.
#4 is the piece that really turned me red. As it happens, a child born “poor” in the U.S. has a greater chance of moving into the top income levels than in any other country. Conversely, a child born “rich” in the U.S. has a better chance of dropping down in status – not because of risk, but because if you just sit on your money and don’t work, others will take advantage of opportunities to surpass you.
It’s like saying that a baseball player “is unlikely to reach base on the next attempt.” Well, duh. If you consistently hit .300, you can be an All-Star. If we had a bet where every time Albert Pujols had a base hit I gave you a dollar, and every time he made an out you gave me a dollar, I’d win! The issue here isn’t raw outcome, it’s comparative. And compared to the rest of the world, there is more fluidity in our wealth. Our rich are more likely to get poor than Luxembourg’s rich, and our poor are more likely to get rich than Denmark’s poor.
Content without context is a spinmeister’s best friend. We’d be better served if more people were trained in critical thinking – the internal alarms that go off when information is offered with big gaping holes.
[tags]Ike Pigott, Occam’s RazR, Economics, income, Parade, spin[/tags]
about 1 year ago
< hug >Ike< /hug >
about 1 year ago
I guess the site doesn’t like HTML in comments. I tried a geeky little joke, which is replicated below with some additional spacing that should allow it to display this time. My previous comment was:
Ike
The point is, great post.
about 1 year ago
And…it still didn’t work. I quit.
about 1 year ago
Parade always has something that gets me riled up…you are correct, but unfortunately, people bask in ignorance and believe what they are fed…no questions asked.
about 1 year ago
This is what I liken to a classic Commie ploy which I’m quite used to from living here in the former Czechoslovakia. To be sure, much of the time it happens due to resource shortages — i.e. cub journalists on low-pay grades working for the major dailies and rags who don’t bother checking sources and/or who cherry-pick feeds from the major wire services (egs. CTK/Czech News Agency, Thompson Reuters, AFP, AP, etc).
As for the Czech mindset ((and the post-Communist one, more generally), the citizenry without full-time access to the net or due to sheer laziness gobble up this claptrap as if it’s the Gospel itself.
I know what you mean, and way to parse this one, brother.
about 1 year ago
Cool POV post. Do you have a footnote for this?
Could be helpful.
Thanks.
about 1 year ago
Referring to this: “As it happens, a child born “poor” in the U.S. has a greater chance of moving into the top income levels than in any other country. “
about 1 year ago
It would alarm me as well but even though that think tank is a well known progressive tank, the report those quotes came from(“Wealth Mobility
and Volatility
in Black and White”), when viewed in it’s entirety is not quite as silly or unresearched as when it is taken out of context and placed in “Parade”.
about 1 year ago
Not sure how much you know about Europe, Ike. But your critical thinking is off the rails if you believe impovershed US children have the same standard of living as “average” European kids.
First, airconditioning is hardly a standard of living indicator — most Europeans don’t need aircon, or want it. One reason “sick building” syndrome is largely unknown.
Second, a US child living in poverty is probably living largely on processed foods, high-fructose corn syrup. bleached white bread, etc — and you know this, if you glance at the shopping carts in poorer parts of Birmingham, I am sure. That is NOT the case here in Europe, I assure you — and the obesity levels prove it.
Third, once you get past a certain amount, housing size is irrelevant. Housing standards, though, are very important to childhood health, and here I can say the poorest European housing is streets ahead (by law) of the housing of the poor in the States.
Finally, the poor child in Denmark is far more likely to become middle-class or more than the poor child in the US. The education is far better and more accessible, and the health care and dental care doesn’t depend on the ability of the parent to pay.
So while the Parade article may infuriate you, try not to let your irritation lead you into the very trap you are bemoaning.
about 1 year ago
Allan, there are few things rotten in Denmark, but Denmark is not indicative of the median in Europe.
And bear in mind the relative nature of these statistics. There will always be a bottom quintile, even if those living there today have it much better than their middle-class ancestors.
Here is a wider breakdown of how U.S. standard of living has changed in the last couple of generations. Air conditioners are but a single example.
about 1 year ago
Spin, crap and diversion. Boy, you are the master…
No, Denmark is not the “median” of Europe, but it’s close. A lot closer to the “median” of Europe than Alabama will ever be the median of the US.
But.. maybe you have other countries in mind? You brought up Denmark, but maybe you meant.. Sweden? Germany? The Netherlands? the UK?
“There will always be a bottom quintile…” Well, you never brought up “quintiles” before, did you? What do quintiles mean when you compare apples and oranges? You indicated that America’s bottom quintile has a better chance than Europe’s of reaching aflluence… evidence? Love to see that.
And then you spin off to an article that has nothing to do with your original post.
Sloppy going for a guy railing against lies, damned lies and statistics.
Allan