I wrote a bit about this yesterday, but there really is something fishy about the new NAEP test in Economics. Kevin Drum notes for example that looking at three different NAEP subject tests together you get the absurd result that "35% are proficient in reading and 23% are proficient in math, but 42% are alleged to be proficient in economics." One of the sample questions, meanwhile, seems to confuse the idea of a "risk" with the idea of a "cost."
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More EconoNAEP
09 Aug 2007 08:06 am
Comments (5)
What's not to understand? The NAEP website ends in dot-gov and we're six years into a Bush administration. Connect the dots, QED, and mais voila!
What you have to remember is that American economics 'education' is propaganda for the simple-minded. Those who actually master the tools of reading, writing, and 'rithmatick generally veer further and further from the bullshit machine comprised of the 'investment' community and their sycophants in the think tanks and universities.
American children are taught that governments, like families, must balance their budgets. In the real world, people who master deficit financing pile up huge accounts in Swiss banks. Partly by persuading the poor schmucks who took economics in high school to invest their wages in capitalist ventures.
All part of socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor.
Most economic theories treat risk as just another cost.
The student's answer was poorly phrased, but had the right idea. A lower income in the short term makes a person subject to greater risks of shocks (like unexpected medical bills), even if that lower income is due to education that will eventually yield a higher lifetime income.
the implication would be that there is a significant number of innumerate economists, a slightly smaller but still material number of illiterate economists and a small percentage of economists who are both illiterate and innumerate. Why do you find this implausible, Matt? I'd say that the percentages were about right.
The results are not absurd. There is no inherent "proficiency." Proficiency is a matter of judgment. Panels of educators get together and look at test items. They determine whether a hypothetical "proficient" student should be able to answer them correctly. The results are compiled into an overall level of proficiency for the test. Separate panels can come up with separate judgments, and each test is rated separately. So it is perfectly logical that a definition of proficiency can be higher in math than in economics.
Comments closed August 23, 2007.
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Heads in the Sand
I'll be more explicit -- the economics education community at the pre-college level exists to justify its own existence. Every study of high school economics gives the same result -- that nothing is being learned -- and each study tries to pretend that its tiny differences between ethnic groups or public/private schools means something. Meanwhile, the assessments are full of typographical errors, confusing examples, and outright useless questions.
Posted by Kimmitt | August 9, 2007 10:49 AM