This is a large part of why COVID-19 has hit the United States so hard.
Is the United States significantly less numerate than other countries? I agree quantitative reasoning is good and we want more of it, but I’m not sure it’s the major contributor to the thing you’re trying to explain here.
A lot of what PISA results reflect is countries desire to score a certain way. The Asian countries want to score highly for prestige reasons and run the tests in schools with above average students. On the other hand countries like the US or Germany who used low scores as a justification for domestic reform.
Here’s a table sorted for math. The US is 37th out of 78 on the list, below Spain and above Israel; the tiers are “rich Asian city-state”, “small country in Asia or Europe”, and then “large country in Europe or less impressive small country,” and the US is low-ranked in that third tier. (The difference between Japan and the US is smaller than the difference between the US and Mexico.)
Being bad at quantitative reasoning is only half the problem. The rest is lack of trust and cooperation. If people weren’t trying to figure things out themselves, their innumeracy wouldn’t matter.
Is the United States significantly less numerate than other countries? I agree quantitative reasoning is good and we want more of it, but I’m not sure it’s the major contributor to the thing you’re trying to explain here.
The US does pretty badly in the world tables for school performance in math especially considering its GDp/capita. https://www.oecd.org/pisa/PISA-results_ENGLISH.png
A lot of what PISA results reflect is countries desire to score a certain way. The Asian countries want to score highly for prestige reasons and run the tests in schools with above average students. On the other hand countries like the US or Germany who used low scores as a justification for domestic reform.
Here’s a table sorted for math. The US is 37th out of 78 on the list, below Spain and above Israel; the tiers are “rich Asian city-state”, “small country in Asia or Europe”, and then “large country in Europe or less impressive small country,” and the US is low-ranked in that third tier. (The difference between Japan and the US is smaller than the difference between the US and Mexico.)
Being bad at quantitative reasoning is only half the problem. The rest is lack of trust and cooperation. If people weren’t trying to figure things out themselves, their innumeracy wouldn’t matter.