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Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

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Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#151

Post by phs318u »

abrahamepton wrote: post #71
blfr wrote: post #49

But, of course, it's not just a matter of dollars and cents. It's also a matter of letters and words. Affluent parents talk to their kids three more hours a week on average than poor parents, which is critical during a child's formative early years. That's why, as Stanford professor Sean Reardon explains, "rich students are increasingly entering kindergarten much better prepared to succeed in school than middle-class…

This is one of the most HN comments ever. Without getting into the nature-vs-nurture debate for the trillionth time, "Actually, mostly a matter of genes because this is by far the biggest influence parents have on their kids" is a totally preposterous statement. Genes are certainly AN influence, but I think my parents' encouraging my nerdiness, buying me a graphing calculator in high school and surrounding me with co…

We'll never know for sure, but would you likely have turned into an artist if your parents had surrounded you with paints and canvases instead? Would you have possibly turned into a tinkerer/problem-solver "of some sort" even if your parents hadn't surrounded you with computers?

It's interesting that you say your parents "encouraged" your nerdiness and didn't say they "instilled" nerdiness in you. It implies there was something innate to start with.

Perhaps there is a set of genes linking curiosity, detail-orientation, problem solving that are at the core of people that become engineers, programmers etc?

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#152

Post by zeveb »

ccallebs wrote: post #143
nqzero wrote: post #134

"cultural fit" is a huge contributor to this limited mobility

Honestly, I think this explains quite a bit. I grew up fairly poor (single income household in Appalachia). I had to train myself out of a lot of speech patterns / mannerisms that don't fly in other parts of America. It's unfortunate, but the stereotype of inbred white trash is still alive and strong when most people hear Appalachian drawls. They hear the way we talk and immediately think we're ignorant. It's an open…

I'd go so far as to argue that it's harder to get by as a white Appalachian than as a black urbanite. Plenty of people & programmes care about the latter; few about the former.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#154

Post by Gustomaximus »

An event that will always stay with me, some years ago I a job opened up where I would have some sway in recommending candidates. I had a uni friend who would fit the role well. A great bloke, smart and hard working. He came from a very blue collar, low income background. His job was pretty middle of the road stuff.

This job would have been lateral in responsibility but in a better industry giving about 2+ times salary. I mentioned this role and said I would get him a chat with the hiring manager. They seemed interested. I said you can double your salary. At this point they got cold feet and said 'it sounds too important for me'. I told them I knew the job, that it would suit them and I wouldn't burn my own credibility if I want confident they would succeed. But they money spooked them.

And while this was a sample of one it really opened my eyes to sense of entitlement that comes with growing up in a wealthy vs poor enviroment. And simply the expectations you approach life with, having a overriding effect on natural ability.

There are so many variable in play for this its not a one issue answer but I suspect this one is more important than we typically give it credit for. An expectation on oneself of where we should end up based on how we grow up.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#155

Post by soreal »

See, this is the thing about population studies.

1. Millions of people live their life 2. Academics put people into buckets in order to count them 3. Other academics group that data and label those people 4. Even more other academics come along and do more groupings then write a paper. 5. A newspaper writes an article with a catchy headline and an out-of-context image with arrows drawn on it to call your attention to one correlation but not others, then proceeds to use that data to make arguments that don't actually follow

At every step along the way, a biased researcher or newspaper makes assumptions, discards outliers, and labels individuals in such a way that if we focus on their chosen pivot, we see what they want us to see.

Longitudinal studies, machine learning, and more are all improvements on the current shaky process. I just hope they continue to catch on despite being tougher to do.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#156

Post by peller »

Kalium wrote: post #149
peller wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK. What might you or your friends have found to be more helpful uses of time? It doesn't have to be in a classroom setting. Or in your experience was the curricula more-or-less sufficient and you consider something(s) else might be better targets for improvement/change? I would like to understand your perspective better.

Most of us would say material directly relevant to our later specializations of choice. That's difficult to do in practice, both because of the diversity involved and because of the difficulty in predicting eventual specialization. Not everyone knows at 12 that they want to be a programmer! More diverse electives for specialist history would have been nice, but there are practical restrictions on the specialist teach…

Huh. I felt the same way about my high school. I suppose I shouldn't be so surprised.

I wonder if it could be feasible to rotate kids through some kind of county/state shared resource with opportunities for "demoing" various specializations. Educational almost-internships for kids, if you will. 180 days/year, 5 days/week = 36 specializations. That's probably not enough time to get much of any feel. Kids pick their top 5 or 10, and spend a year learning about those. You don't necessarily need a specialist teacher for everything, but rather a specialist skilled in teaching research / getting to the bottom of a field/industry. Make the kids teach each other; teacher is basically a facilitator? Too impractical?

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#157

Post by peterkshultz »

soreal wrote: post #155

See, this is the thing about population studies. 1. Millions of people live their life 2. Academics put people into buckets in order to count them 3. Other academics group that data and label those people 4. Even more other academics come along and do more groupings then write a paper. 5. A newspaper writes an article with a catchy headline and an out-of-context image with arrows drawn on it to call your attention to…

I agree with your take on newspapers: they try and capture the attention of a layman audience. As such, their work can be simplified to the point of impropriety from time to time.

I'm less inclined to agree with your opinion on academic research, however. Systems of peer review--and softer systems, like those of repute amongst colleagues--are in place for the express purpose of eliminating biases and errors across research works.

In the social sciences, there is a great amount of care that goes into ensuring that: 1. Data is handled properly 2. Future inquiries are sound

Whether or not that care happened in this body of work is up for debate.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#158

Post by peterkshultz »

wnevets wrote: post #100

Its much easier to make money when you already have money, ever had to play monopoly while behind?

For those who aren't aware, Monopoly and its predecessors were actually designed to demonstrate the effects of income inequality:

http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/the-landlords-game/

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#159

Post by ubernostrum »

michael_h wrote: post #109
blfr wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK. "each point increase in IQ test scores raises income by between $234 and $616 per year" http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289607... and conscientiousness may even trump IQ when it comes to SES http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2009/06/does_personalit....

That's 'high IQ'->'higher income'. You are implying 'higher income'->'high IQ', of which there are multitudes of counterexamples.

This comment should not be downvoted. It's correct in describing what's being asserted. And what's being asserted is the definition of the affirming the consequent.

I know this is HN and we love to point and shout the names of informal fallacies, but maybe learning some formal ones would be useful, too.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#160

Post by Kalium »

peller wrote: post #156
Kalium wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of us would say material directly relevant to our later specializations of choice. That's difficult to do in practice, both because of the diversity involved and because of the difficulty in predicting eventual specialization. Not everyone knows at 12 that they want to be a programmer! More diverse electives for specialist history would have been nice, but there are practical restrictions on the specialist teach…

Huh. I felt the same way about my high school. I suppose I shouldn't be so surprised. I wonder if it could be feasible to rotate kids through some kind of county/state shared resource with opportunities for "demoing" various specializations. Educational almost-internships for kids, if you will. 180 days/year, 5 days/week = 36 specializations. That's probably not enough time to get much of any feel. Kids pick their to…

I would agree it's not enough time, and plenty of workplaces aren't practical for that. Psychology and medicine come to mind for privacy reasons, and lots of workplaces are generally not kid-friendly (construction sites, heavy factories...)

Getting kids to teach each other strikes me as impractical. Most of them aren't going to learn enough in a few days to teach a useful amount, and learning about a profession through the lens of an opinionated kid seems very sub-optimal. Plus, a year is a lot of time.

I have seen a lot of schools have "career day" type things, where parents come in and briefly discuss what they do. That's a little more direct and a less time consuming at ten to fifteen minutes a parent. This is valuable in proportion to the economic diversity and schedule flexibility of parents, though.

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