Brain Drain Across the United States • Hacker News Board

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#131

Post by drb91 » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:24 AM UTC

defen wrote: post #51

Now, consider the "meta-brain-drain" of 1) increased assortative mating (people are increasingly more likely to marry someone of similar educational and professional achievement) and 2) college-educated women delaying childbirth and having fewer children than non-college-educated women. The net result is that more educated people tend to have fewer children than the less educated. If we assume educational attainment…

I don’t see any reason to assume that intelligence is strongly correlated with parent intelligence. Weakly, sure, but nurture factors contribute immensely. I attribute my own success not to genetics, though my parents are successful, but to reading a LOT as a kid and an upbringing encouraging curiosity, and then nepotism. The knack I have for puzzles that I share with my family seems to contribute less to my place in the world and more the roles I choose in this place—that is, I don’t think it has significantly impacted my material position—much more due to the earthly explanations of privilege.

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#132

Post by neilv » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:30 AM UTC

defen wrote: post #51

Now, consider the "meta-brain-drain" of 1) increased assortative mating (people are increasingly more likely to marry someone of similar educational and professional achievement) and 2) college-educated women delaying childbirth and having fewer children than non-college-educated women. The net result is that more educated people tend to have fewer children than the less educated. If we assume educational attainment…

I think you have some good points, but I don't think the following is a safe assumption, and it can be very counterproductive:

> If we assume educational attainment is correlated with intelligence, and children's intelligence is correlated to parental intelligence, [...]

You could imagine how this idea can discourage people of modest origins, and can also encourage people of advantage to see themselves as innately superior.

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#133

Post by ikeyany » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:31 AM UTC

drb91 wrote: post #131

defen wrote: post #51

Now, consider the "meta-brain-drain" of 1) increased assortative mating (people are increasingly more likely to marry someone of similar educational and professional achievement) and 2) college-educated women delaying childbirth and having fewer children than non-college-educated women. The net result is that more educated people tend to have fewer children than the less educated. If we assume educational attainment…

I don’t see any reason to assume that intelligence is strongly correlated with parent intelligence. Weakly, sure, but nurture factors contribute immensely. I attribute my own success not to genetics, though my parents are successful, but to reading a LOT as a kid and an upbringing encouraging curiosity, and then nepotism. The knack I have for puzzles that I share with my family seems to contribute less to my place in…

It takes high intelligence to teach your kids to read or do puzzles as a hobby. Your parents could have just as easily put you in front of a TV for your whole childhood, or they could have provided a stressful or abusive environment to grow up in. Intelligence takes many forms.

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#134

Post by briandear » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:32 AM UTC

michelpp wrote: post #65

toasterlovin wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking frankly, I don’t see what anything that you posted has to do with brain drain. All you’re doing is pointing out unrelated things which you think makes the senator look bad.

In short order the Supreme Court will decide on whether or not to include a citizenship question on the upcoming census. The result of including the question will sow fear in non-citizens, fully entitled to be counted (the census requires "whole persons", not just citizens) and is projected to cause an undercount of many, many millions of people in "brain gain" states. This will directly effect the amount of federal…

If the census can ask any questions at all other than “how many people are in your household,” then certainly a question of citizenship is relevant. Many, many countries include citizenship in their census, it’s not at all unreasonable. Citizenship is far more relevant than race. France for example, forbids asking race and ethnicity however they do, in fact, ask about citizenship. Why wouldn’t we want to know the citizenship of the people living in the country? It seems like very useful data.

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#135

Post by blub » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:33 AM UTC

trabant00 wrote: post #115

defen wrote: post #51

Now, consider the "meta-brain-drain" of 1) increased assortative mating (people are increasingly more likely to marry someone of similar educational and professional achievement) and 2) college-educated women delaying childbirth and having fewer children than non-college-educated women. The net result is that more educated people tend to have fewer children than the less educated. If we assume educational attainment…

Maybe education _is_ the problem. Maybe we're teaching children that things like career and information hoarding are more important than family and living life in general. And maybe hyper specialized brains (almost computers) should stay in low numbers relative to the general population. Maybe we're just walking hard drives, full of "facts". Maybe we're not as smart as we think.

"We" are not teaching. Everyone can see for themselves that raising kids is a thankless, difficult job which can hardly be reconciled with a successful career.

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#136

Post by chrischattin » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:34 AM UTC

defen wrote: post #51

Now, consider the "meta-brain-drain" of 1) increased assortative mating (people are increasingly more likely to marry someone of similar educational and professional achievement) and 2) college-educated women delaying childbirth and having fewer children than non-college-educated women. The net result is that more educated people tend to have fewer children than the less educated. If we assume educational attainment…

An interesting way to look at this is that nature (from an evolutionary perspective) is selecting away from what the popular sentiment of this board considers intelligent.

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#137

Post by ikeyany » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:37 AM UTC

refurb wrote: post #45

lotsofpulp wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sick leave, parental leave, legal marijuana, assisted suicide, non compete bans, better environmental protections, pro choice, are all desirable to the young people I know and red states go the other way on those policies.

Huh! The fastest growing states in 2018 were: Nevada, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Florida and Washington.[1] [1] https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2018/estimate...

My theories:

ID/UT/AZ -> Lower/middle class people can no longer afford to live comfortably in California

FL/WA -> People are getting sick of the progressively longer, shittier winters in the midwest/northeast

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#138

Post by solatic » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:39 AM UTC

phamilton wrote: post #117

shmageggy wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It seems like we as a society need to figure out a way to make "have children at a reasonable age" not be a low-status move for highly educated / driven / intelligent women. Isn't the obvious answer better maternity leave laws? Ambitious women in the US don't have kids because it fucks their career. The US is literally last among OECD countries, offering zero guaranteed maternity pay [1]. [1] https://money.cnn.com/…

One big part of this is that even if you have guaranteed maternity pay, it still hurts your career. In a highly competitive environment, I don't see how not working for X amount of time doesn't lead to being X amount of time behind in career growth. The answer is to have less competitive environments. In Sweden, jantelagen (a cultural sentiment that discourages overt personal ambition) is a huge part of what enables…

You can't really tell American business culture to be less competitive. You might as well try to get Klingons to be less war-happy. If you're going to try to improve the situation for women, you have to work within the system as it exists.

The best hope is improving remote work and improving transportation infrastructure. Women don't have to leave jobs that they can do from home, and client visits are less impactful when they take less time to visit the client and return. It's not a solution which fits nicely into a single bill of legislation to be passed, but it's the groundwork that the US needs to make it happen.

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#139

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:40 AM UTC

ikeyany wrote: post #133

drb91 wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t see any reason to assume that intelligence is strongly correlated with parent intelligence. Weakly, sure, but nurture factors contribute immensely. I attribute my own success not to genetics, though my parents are successful, but to reading a LOT as a kid and an upbringing encouraging curiosity, and then nepotism. The knack I have for puzzles that I share with my family seems to contribute less to my place in…

It takes high intelligence to teach your kids to read or do puzzles as a hobby. Your parents could have just as easily put you in front of a TV for your whole childhood, or they could have provided a stressful or abusive environment to grow up in. Intelligence takes many forms.

[deleted]

Re: Brain Drain Across the United States

#140

Post by jasonkester » Sun, Apr 28, 2019, 5:42 AM UTC

defen wrote: post #51

Now, consider the "meta-brain-drain" of 1) increased assortative mating (people are increasingly more likely to marry someone of similar educational and professional achievement) and 2) college-educated women delaying childbirth and having fewer children than non-college-educated women. The net result is that more educated people tend to have fewer children than the less educated. If we assume educational attainment…

Perhaps educated people are better at realising that 40 is a “reasonable age” to have children, while 24 is not.

Raising kids after 15 years of extra life experience, savings, and career advancement sure does make having kids easy. It was pretty straightforward in my experience but I couldn’t imagine how I would have pulled it off back when I was trying to scrape together some savings with my entry level job and tiny studio apartment.