{"id":52671,"date":"2014-02-22T19:18:55","date_gmt":"2014-02-23T03:18:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=52671"},"modified":"2014-02-22T19:18:55","modified_gmt":"2014-02-23T03:18:55","slug":"your-life-chances-are-largely-shaped-by-your-genes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=52671","title":{"rendered":"Your Life Chances Are Largely Shaped By Your Genes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Economist Gregory Clark wrote<\/a> in the New York Times Feb. 21, 2014:<\/p>\n

To a striking extent, your overall life chances can be predicted not just from your parents\u2019 status but also from your great-great-great-grandparents\u2019. The recent study suggests that 10 percent of variation in income can be predicted based on your parents\u2019 earnings. In contrast, my colleagues and I estimate that 50 to 60 percent of variation in overall status is determined by your lineage…
\nDoes this imply that individuals have no control over their life outcomes? No. In modern meritocratic societies, success still depends on individual effort. Our findings suggest, however, that the compulsion to strive, the talent to prosper and the ability to overcome failure are strongly inherited. We can\u2019t know for certain what the mechanism of that inheritance is, though we know that genetics plays a surprisingly strong role. Alternative explanations that are in vogue \u2014 cultural traits, family economic resources, social networks \u2014 don\u2019t hold up to scrutiny.<\/p>\n

Family names tell you, for better or worse, a lot: The average life span of an American with the typically Jewish surname Katz is 80.2 years, compared with 64.6 years for those with the surname Begay (or Begaye), which is strongly associated with Native Americans. Heberts, whites of New France descent, live on average three years less than Dohertys, whites of Irish descent…<\/p>\n

The notion of genetic transmission of \u201csocial competence\u201d \u2014 some mysterious mix of drive and ability \u2014 may unsettle us. But studies of adoption, in some ways the most dramatic of social interventions, support this view. A number of studies of adopted children in the United States and Nordic countries show convincingly that their life chances are more strongly predicted from their biological parents than their adoptive families. In America, for example, the I.Q. of adopted children correlates with their adoptive parents\u2019 when they are young, but the correlation is close to zero by adulthood. There is a low correlation between the incomes and educational attainment of adopted children and those of their adoptive parents.<\/p>\n

These studies, along with studies of correlations across various types of siblings (identical twins, fraternal twins, half siblings) suggest that genetics is the main carrier of social status.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Economist Gregory Clark wrote in the New York Times Feb. 21, 2014: To a striking extent, your overall life chances can be predicted not just from your parents\u2019 status but also from your great-great-great-grandparents\u2019. The recent study suggests that 10 … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-race"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t