Post: #1

http://anepigone.blogspot.com/2014/06/ju...stowe.html





Calculated average IQ of indigenous populations from the book Race Differences in Intelligence by Richard Lynn. Lynn's datasets are criticized as being unrepresentative (Heredity April 2004, Volume 92, Number 4, Pages 359-360).[39]



IQ by country, (green is highest, yellow is second-highest). - See more at: http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2008/05/iq-a...uyKZ8.dpuf

http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2008/05/iq-a...tions.html



Sober, meticulously-marshaled evidence and a quick turn of phrase are simultaneously on display at TWCS. Regarding the latter, M.G. describes the IMF as the "international equivalent of a payday loan place". (One quibble--the payday loan business is actually a fairly profitable one).

The meat of the post spurred me to run some numbers and discover a boringly predictable result. The inverse correlation between a nation's estimated average IQ and its commercial bank prime lending rate--described by the CIA World Factbook as "a simple average of annualized interest rates commercial banks charge on new loans, denominated in the national currency, to their most credit-worthy customers"--is a statistically significant, vigorous .69 (p-value = .0000000000004). Just as the more intelligent the person, the more likely he is to pay back what he owes, so the more intelligent the population, the more reliable they tend to be when it comes to making good on what they've borrowed. It's almost as though the characteristics of a nation have something to do with the characteristics of the people who populate it.

Post: #2

So high IQ low bank interest rates. Low IQ high bank interest rates?

How do you explain QE and artificially playing with interest rates? What about negative interest rates?

While statistically significant, the interest rate environment we have now is being manipulated hard core. I'd be curious to see how high the interest rates go once QE ends.

Post: #3

How about Japan and the UK having the highest public debt loads on earth?

Both are "high IQ" nations but their books would make debt ridden third world nations blush.

Post: #4

I think this is an example of spurious correlation. Given the high level of education generally required for a central bank position, I doubt central bankers are anywhere near average intelligence anywhere. Average IQ people don't decide squat.

Underlying factors are more likely the relationship with education levels and IQ, as well as higher interest rates in developing countries (which have lower education levels).

Post: #5

This analysis ignores the fact that most of the historically high IQ nations were the world's largest creditors with moderately high interest rates. If you were to do this analysis 70 years ago you'd get a completely different result.

Post: #6

While I dont doubt the correlation between average IQ and bank lend rate, I would be questionable to say its causal. If I had to guess, I would believe the average IQ is also correlated, and possibly caused, by industrialization. The justification for high IQ would be that its more readily used by the economy versus other skills, like being strong. To boost this attribute, it would require good schooling which requires a reasonably high amount of money to spend. If you have a lot of money to spend, you would probably have be more able to pay back your loans. Where would that money come from? Taxes from a more developed economy requiring higher IQ.

This is one of those situations where id dump a bunch of variables into a factor analysis and/or correlation matrix to see if im seeing cross correlation and a possible unseen an variable affecting the data.

Post: #7

Even if the correlation were indicative of some kind of causation, I don't see how I can trade off of this.