In IQ tests, its peak is 100, where 50% of the population is expected to be found. Tests are tested and "normalized" around this. We aren't sure if it is actually real, since we don't really know what IQ is except for that it is what IQ tests measure. We do know that the tests that similate IQ tests, those standardized tests we give to large numbers of students at a time, have to be altered as sometimes the test changes with culture and technological advances and just plain time. (if you have never had an individually administered IQ test, don't brag about your IQ, its probably never been checked).
In other populations, you would expect in a total population that has not been skewed by other parameters, to find that 50% of that population is on one half of the curve (say---right) and the other half on the left. That makes the middle of the bell curve also the 50th percentile. That means way over on the right of the curve, where it has dipped down pretty good, is about the 90th percentile. That means that if a person's number is way over there, there aren't very many people sharing that spot and they are doing "better, faster, older, smarter, richer, or whatever. The same spot on the other side would be about the same number of people (or dogs, or tests, or whatever the "n" is) and about the 10th percentile and they would only be doing better than 10% of the participants. Its symetrical. Humans like symmetry, it's one of the things we use to judge beauty and fairness and whether we have applied our make-up correctly.
There are populations, that due to human intervention or some other force, do not fall on the Bell curve. Examples would be chihuahuas and post-AIDS hemophiliacs. The dogs have been impacted by genetic manipulation. Not that we messed with their actual genes, but that we controlled their breeding. For the traits that are desired, that the breed is bred for, the curve will be skewed to the right, and for those that are breed to remove the curve will be skewed to the left. For those poor individuals that experienced the discovery of AIDS while requiring blood products in the pre-testing timeframe, the curve is not just skewed, it is a cliff.
There are other things that can happen to a bell curve. One of the more confusing is when it has two different hills. That acually means you have two different populations being measured on the same curve. An example of this, is the current wealth of the US. The best way to show this would be two show it on two bell curves--the top 2% and the bottom 98%. The top 2% has 98% of the wealth, and by percentile, you would expect that the people at the 98th percentile would have more than 98% of the population. But you would also expect that at the 50th percentile, 50% of the wealth would exist. Not true here. Everyone under the 98th percentile is sharing the same leftover 2%. The two percent of the money is divided along a skewed bell curve, but not that severely skewed. It skews to the left. The top 98% of the money is its own bell curve, and it it also skewed to the left, with a much larger number of individuals making $300,000/year than the far right end, where the fortune-500 members live.
So, in numbers, about 50% of the US population makes less than $30,000/year, another 40% make $30,000-$100,000/year (we are now at the 90th percentile) and about 8% make over $100,000 but less than $300,000/year. The next 1% is the makers of over $300,000 to under $500,000/year. That final 1% makes at least a half a million a year to several billion/year. Curious? The IRS has their own fortune 400 that is based on the top 400 income tax returns. Stats only, the "who" is private.
So the point is? We have two population in the good ole US of A. The ruling class and the peasantry. Shades of Europe in the middle ages.
Since I should be doing my taxes and instead I'm writing this, I will make a suggestion. Its a start, only, but its a new tax law suggestion. A variation of the Flat Tax. The biggest change would be to the individual deductions. Where we currently get some number chosen from something that has nothing to do with life, I think we should plug in the income at poverty level. That is what it takes to feed and clothe and shelter 1 person without assistance. In 2014, for one person, that is $11,670. For a couple filing together, $15,730, for a family of 4, 23,550. In Alaska, where the cost of living is higher, the same family of four would be$29,440, in Hawaii $27,090. I personally would use Alaska for everyone since there should be some benefit to living in middle America. Everything over that, whether salary, wage, capital gain, or any other source of income, would be 25%. I think this would solve the problem of the person making 1 dollar over poverty and paying taxes and the person making 1 billion paying no taxes--and solve it well.
Reality is, it costs no more for a rich person to get enough calories to live, water to drink and shelter to stay warm than a poor person. All that other stuff, the compounds and 3 vacation houses, the sixteen cars, the new wardrobe every season--designer and custom only, that is fat. And fat should always be taxable. Since we haven't gone with a national healthcare system yet, medical expenses should also remain until we figure that one out. Interest? I always liked it, but it is a sign of a sick economy and a sicker way of life, not a reason for a deduction.
If there were only 400 homeless people in the country, that would be fine, but we currently have constitution that implies equality yet the people making the laws that are supposed to support the ideal of equality are in the 2% almost to the man (was that an accident? well there are 20 women in the senate and 79 women in the house, so perhaps I should have said person). There are 100 senators. There are 435 representatives in the House, so that is 18% female. All 535 members of Congress are worth an average $966,001 each, according to a new analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics.
A typical American household has a net worth of about $66,740 – a value that has been declining since the start of the most recent recession. Between 2007 and 2010, the median net worth of American households sank 47.1 percent. Food stamp enrollment increased by 15.5 million since 2009 and recent job creation figures show that low-paying jobs have largely replaced higher paying ones.
At a time when the majority is struggling financially, the nation’s leaders are accumulating more wealth. The new freshmen congress members have an average net worth greater than 1,000,000.
If they represent the people shouldn't their entry-level income mirror the average American? Is our country politically becoming as corrupt as any third world country?
Where is the hope for the majority that is supposedly ruling?
Where is the hope?
Where is the hope for the majority that is supposedly ruling?
Where is the hope?
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