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Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

news.harvard.edu

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Re: Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

#41

Post by codeddesign »

riskable wrote: post #38
autokad wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't believe they thought it was that high. I mean general unemployment is no where near 27% and you'd suspect that with threat of losing visa status, immigrants are more likelier to take a job they dont exactly grok.

When arguing about immigrants and unemployment I always wondered why people get so upset over it. If the immigrant is even able to collect unemployment that means they paid for it . So they're literally just getting the money back that they paid into it. Probably considerably less, even! So why should anyone care that they're collecting a benefit that they paid for? I don't get it.

Do people get upset over legal immigrants? (Such as through marriage or relative) As far as I am aware it’s mainly about illegal immigration. However, if you are on a work visa, I believe the law states the visa is revoked if you lose your job with the employer.

Re: Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

#42

Post by 3pt14159 »

autokad wrote: post #14
Leary wrote: post #8

What share of US immigrants receive unemployment? Democrats: 25.6% Republicans: 27.1% Reality: 5.5% It seems the bigger bias comes from the general media than any particular party political bias.

I can't believe they thought it was that high. I mean general unemployment is no where near 27% and you'd suspect that with threat of losing visa status, immigrants are more likelier to take a job they dont exactly grok.

The question is a bit ambiguous though. I could see people thinking "I'm sure a quarter of them have been on it at some point" rather than hearing the question as "what percentage of immigrants are on unemployment at the present time?"

Re: Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

#44

Post by codeddesign »

riskable wrote: post #38
autokad wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't believe they thought it was that high. I mean general unemployment is no where near 27% and you'd suspect that with threat of losing visa status, immigrants are more likelier to take a job they dont exactly grok.

When arguing about immigrants and unemployment I always wondered why people get so upset over it. If the immigrant is even able to collect unemployment that means they paid for it . So they're literally just getting the money back that they paid into it. Probably considerably less, even! So why should anyone care that they're collecting a benefit that they paid for? I don't get it.

Unfortunately all media is biased, with most primarily taking a far left stance. This is likely just due to $$$ as we live in a capitalist society. If I owned a news station the questions I would ask is “what demographic is the most profitable to us?” and “what content brings in the most money?”

Re: Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

#45

Post by noetic_techy »

rayiner wrote: post #21

The problem is that “verifiable fact” is actually very complicated in any context where you’re talking about politics. Two of the questions on the first graphic are about income mobility for people born in the bottom quantile. The graphic is correct, as far as it goes, but overlooks huge differences by race. While the average American born in the bottom 20% has a 7.8% chance of reaching the top 20%, that number is ac…

> While the average American born in the bottom 20% has a 7.8% chance of reaching the top 20%, that number is actually 25% for Asians.

Exactly. Amy Chau wrote a great book called The Triple Package that points this out and the fact that its not just Asians (which broadly lumps Indians and all other Asian cultures together): Nigerian immigrants, Cuban exiles, Lebonese, Mormons, Iranians, Jews, all see roughly the same phenomena of surpassing average American household income. Its considered taboo to point out that income inequality is largely cultural.

Re: Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

#46

Post by hirundo »

phkahler wrote: post #39
Leary wrote: post #8

What share of US immigrants receive unemployment? Democrats: 25.6% Republicans: 27.1% Reality: 5.5% It seems the bigger bias comes from the general media than any particular party political bias.

>> It seems the bigger bias comes from the general media than any particular party political bias. From TFA: >> First and foremost, Republicans and Democrats tend to seek out very different news sources so they often get very different information. It should raise red flags for everyone that news sources vary so much on reporting the same thing. We should be selecting news sources based on the types of things they re…

> We should be selecting news sources based on the types of things they report rather than the spin.

You can report nothing but verifiable facts and still add plenty of spin just by selecting the types of things you report. E.g. "here are the details of police deaths and injuries during the riots" versus "here are the details of protester deaths and injuries caused by the police".

Re: Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

#47

Post by azinman2 »

bytedude wrote: post #27
Ididntdothis wrote: post #12

From what I can see the real problem is that most people don’t care about facts anymore. They just want to hear what they think anyway and the political parties are too happy to feed that. When you talk to left wingers and right wingers about the economy of the last ten years the left guys will tell you it was paradise until 2016 and then everything went to hell. The right wingers will tell you it was misery until 20…

Looks like the stock market was flat-lining by the end of Obama's term. https://www.macrotrends.net/1358/dow-jones-industrial-averag... You may not care about facts, but don't generalize too quickly.

2008-2016 has a pretty clear trend.

Re: Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

#48

Post by libbyc5 »

So much for the wisdom of the crowds. Danes look like they have more accurate perceptions about immigration, but I'm not sure if that's actually an improvement for society.

https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/10/2/29

Sometimes it's better to have uninformed priors if you want to give everyone an equal chance.

Re: Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

#49

Post by analyst74 »

Leary wrote: post #8

What share of US immigrants receive unemployment? Democrats: 25.6% Republicans: 27.1% Reality: 5.5% It seems the bigger bias comes from the general media than any particular party political bias.

It might be a problem when people from opposite side of the political spectrum strongly disagree on things; it's an even bigger problem when they agree on the wrong perception, sadly people who suffer from those unanimous but wrong perceptions tend not to have a voice, like immigrants and people living in foreign countries.

Re: Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact

#50

Post by tom-thistime »

bytedude wrote: post #27
Ididntdothis wrote: post #12

From what I can see the real problem is that most people don’t care about facts anymore. They just want to hear what they think anyway and the political parties are too happy to feed that. When you talk to left wingers and right wingers about the economy of the last ten years the left guys will tell you it was paradise until 2016 and then everything went to hell. The right wingers will tell you it was misery until 20…

Looks like the stock market was flat-lining by the end of Obama's term. https://www.macrotrends.net/1358/dow-jones-industrial-averag... You may not care about facts, but don't generalize too quickly.

Did you link the chart you meant to link? Clicking on the link, I see one flat year since 2009.
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