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[in queue] Socioeconomic Inequality in the US
Admin
This paper is posted here for now because there is a 3 paper author limit on the number of submissions per journal. Once (if!) one of the submitted papers gets published, then I will move this one to the submissions forum.

Journal:
Open Quantitative Sociology and Political Science

Authors:
Emil O. W. Kirkegaard
John Fuerst

Title:
Socioeconomic Inequality in the US: Ethnicity, Racial Admixture and Environmental Causes

Abstract:
General socioeconomic factor (S) scores were calculated for US states by SIRE (self-identified race/ethnicity) groups based on 3 indicators. The S factor loadings were generally but not always stable across subgroup analyses and the factor scores were generally stable across factor analytic extraction methods (almost all r's ≈ 1). For Whites, Blacks and Hispanics, there were strong correlations between cognitive ability scores and S factor scores across states (r's = .55 to .78; N's = 28-50). This pattern also held when all data were analyzed together (r = .86, N = 115). Furthermore, the size of the Hispanic-White and Black-White S and cognitive ability gaps strongly correlated across states (r's = .62-.69; N's = 36-37). Lastly, parasite prevalence did not plausibly explain SIRE gaps in cognitive ability because gaps were smaller in more parasite-rich states (combined analysis r = -.17, N = 91).

Previously, we looked at the association between overall state-level racial ancestry and overall state-level outcomes. It was found that European ancestry relative to African and Amerindian ancestry was associated with better outcomes. This analysis was extended by looking at the state-level ancestry-outcome associations individually for Black and Hispanic SIRE groups. For Blacks, state-level European and Amerindian admixture was positively associated with better outcomes (mean r's = .28 and .27), while African admixture was associated with worse outcomes (mean r = -31, N = 31). For Hispanics, African and European admixture was related to better outcomes (mean r's = .36 and .13), while Amerindian admixture was associated with worse outcomes (mean r = -.40; N = 24-34). These SIRE specific state-level results were only partially consistent with the overall state-level ones.
Finally, it was found that climatic and geospatial variables did not correlate strongly with cognitive ability and S scores when scores were decomposed by SIRE group, but did so at the total state-level, even after statistical control.

Key words:
inequality, general socioeconomic factor, S factor, USA, United States, states, cognitive ability, IQ, intelligence, NAEP, race, SIRE, group differences, cognitive sociology, sociology of intelligence, ecology of intelligence

Length:
5400 words, excluding references.

Files:
https://osf.io/dzqen/files/

Reviewers:
We will attempt to get some of the authors who has published on this topic to review. Meisenberg is also a good choice.
A good analysis. Just a few suggestions:
1. On page 8, it should read "...non-trivial African and Amerindian admixture..."
2. Figures 10 and 11: It seems that the results reported here indicate depressed cognitive ability of both Blacks and Whites but not Hispanics in disease-ridden states (i.e., the southern states). This is best explained by selective migration of the smarter Whites and Blacks to the northern states over several generations, since the time of the Civil War when conditions in the South got pretty bad. This selective migration effect did not apply to Hispanics, many of them being recent immigrants. If you think this explanation makes sense, you can include it in the discussion section.
May I ask why Emil O. W. Kirkegaard is obsessed with racial and sex differences? And with confirmation biases?
Admin
May I ask why Emil O. W. Kirkegaard is obsessed with racial and sex differences? And with confirmation biases?


Don't try to derail threads.
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