Blacks Score Much Lower on Academic Tests

No, blacks are not intellectually equal to whites or Asians. Their IQ, Standardized tests, LSAT, MCAT, TASS, MSPAP, SAT and GRE scores are much lower---all lower than white test takers by about the same margin of 1.2 standard deviations.  Nearly 90% of black persons have IQ levels below the white average of 100. (black population median IQ=85, standard deviation=13).

This is the most denied and explosive fact of our day.  In a way, it's the most obvious thing in the world.  Nevertheless, the media continues to bend over backwards to show that blacks in America are doing just fine--showing black experts on TV, hiring black newsreaders to give the appearance of accomplishment and even shielding the first black president from any criticism of his mistakes or his poor performance.

It is politically incorrect to write any of these words.  Meanwhile, every night on the local TV news I hear about horrible crimes committed mostly by black perpetrators night after night:  robberies, violence and gun crimes.  Black males make up 6% of the population but commit 54% of the gun crimes in the US. Correspondingly black incarceration rates are about 7 or 8 times that of whites. Black families are in collapse with some 72% of children born out-of-wedlock with no father to be found.  This is just a brief description of complete collapse of black "culture" and descent into pervasive criminality.  Worse, white youth and media types have exalted "gansta" behavior as something "cool."  Yeah, everything's fine.  Let's just keep pretending that we have nothing to talk about to improve the situation!

But with the prevailing political correctness so divorced  from reality, there can't even be any discussion of appropriate mitigating measures to help the situation.

It is a fact that, in every exam measuring academic aptitude or achievement, blacks scores are about 1.1 standard deviation lower than white (and even lower versus asians).  This is true even after 40 years of affirmative action and various programs to try to close the gap. This was discussed in the books "The Bell Curve" in 1994 and "The Black-White Test Score Gap" book in 1998.  It's true whether the test is the MCAT or LSAT, the SAT, the GRE or TASS or the Maryland School Performance Assessment Program.  Regarding IQ scores, the median of the black score distribution is 85 or about 1.1 standard deviations lower than the white average of 100.

You can't blame "culture" either as the 1.1 standard deviation holds up even when comparing scores of blacks and whites vs family income or family education.  (See Appendix B below).  Test scores go up for all groups with family income or education level--but still maintaining the 1.1 standard deviation gap.  Besides, cultural differences usually mean a difference in native language which is not the case in the US.

The most striking things about this situation follows:

1. If your IQ is 85 or less, you would be expected to qualify for fairly menial jobs with low skills.  This group is half of the US black population.  Sure enough, half of all black high school students drop-out ensuring themselves of limited opportunities.  These people have been filled with false expectations by  the media and government and blame others for their predicament.  They have an idea that they are victims of whites which is a dangerous situation. Their predicament is not really anyone's fault, but their poverty, criminality and cultural collapse is a reality.  
2. With the distribution above, perhaps 12% of blacks are technically "mentally retarded" or at least very limited.  What as a society should we do with these people?  Do we even know what happens with these people?  Do they end up in prison?  Should we guarantee a minimum income for these people who are arguably "disabled?"
3. 85% of black Americans have IQs less than the average white American. This is pretty astonishing. Black people are led by their leadership to blame white people for this.  The reality is that it's not anyone's fault.
4. On the top end of the black IQ distribution is an extremely few blacks with an IQ in the gifted (>130) range. In fact, with the 130 IQ cutoff at over 3.3 standard deviations, blacks are about 50 times fewer than whites in the gifted range (see Appendix A).  Without affirmative action programs there would very few blacks in any of the elite colleges, law or medical schools. This is confirmed by none other than the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education.  It is almost a certainty that Obama would not have been admitted to Harvard without reduced affirmative action standards.  See my blog Grad School: Lower Admission Standards For Blacks and Less Results
5. Not only would there very few blacks in professional schools without affirmative action programs, the gap between black and white is widening.  See my blog Grad School: Lower Admission Standards For Blacks and Less Results.   Meanwhile the Supreme Court has called for a phase-out of raced based admissions standards in 20 years.  Then what?

Solutions Not Being Discussed Due to Racial 'Political Correctness' Problem

1. Where's the discussion about "vocational" high school for low IQ whites and blacks who are clearly not headed for college and may be headed for drop-out status??  Why not teach reading, writing and arithmetic along with vocational skills that would lead to such vocations as a) electrician, b) plumbing, c) secretarial skills, d) cooking, e) nursing assistants, etc??  
2. How about year 'round high schools?  How about spending some money on qualified tutors to help high schoolers in need?  How about an army of volunteers to tutor students who are struggling?  Think Peace Corps for education.
3. Lower skilled and lower IQ people may not be worth the minimum wage.  Naturally, higher minimum wages limit jobs.  So, when Obama calls for a $9 minimum wage, he's showing that he has no knowledge of economics and hurts the very people that he's supposedly trying to help.  He's essentially advocating higher unemployment for many people, both white and black.  The minimum wage should be abolished.  
4. From my blog entitled Academic Disaster in Detroit where young black's academic test scores are perilously close to zero results. Do you think any of those kids are worth $9 per hour?  If minimum wage is a "training wage" shouldn't it be less, not more?  How about eliminating the minimum wage altogether?
5. Are more welfare programs helping or hurting African Americans?  
6. Lower corporate taxes to reduce the incentive for businesses to relocate overseas. Chinese inflation has eliminated their cost advantages now.  Bring back millions of jobs that relocated to Asia over the past 15 years!  This will help everyone!  Economic sluggishness hurts poor people and low skill people the worst.  Why can't anyone other than the Republicans see this problem??  And they call the Republicans the "stupid party??"  See my blog Blog Series #2 Solutions to Big Problems.

Yeah, everything's fine.  Let's just keep pretending that we have nothing to talk about to improve the situation!

Appendix A:  Typical Bell Curve Distributions Showing Standard Deviations

The following is a chart showing a typical bell curve distribution and standard deviations.

For IQs, white IQ scores have a median of 103 points with a standard deviation of about 15 points. From the chart above, whites with an IQ of 130 or above (greater than 2 standard deviations) is about 2.2% of the population.

For black populations in the USA, their IQ scores have a mean of 85 points with a standard deviation estimated at 13 points.  The number of blacks with an IQ greater than 130 is some 3.3 standard deviations or less than 0.1% of that population.  In fact there are 50 times fewer blacks with gifted IQs (>130) than whites statistically.

It's estimated that sub-Saharan populations have IQs less than 75, but there are 'cultural' and language differences for this group. I suspect that those IQ estimates of 75 would be way too high.

Appendix B  Typical Data Comparing Black and White Standardized Test Results

Math SAT Scores Vs Family Income

Verbal SAT Scores Vs Family Income

In the graphs above, note that the best black performance is still below that the lowest income white test-taker.

Verbal SAT Scores Vs Parental Education

Math SAT Scores Vs Parental Education