Here's How Little Math Americans Actually Use at Work
Less than a quarter of employees do any calculations more complicated than basic fractions, and blue-collar workers generally do more advanced math than their white-collar friends.
Remember sitting through high school math class while the teacher droned on about polynomial equations and thinking there wasn't a chance you'd ever use any of it in life? Well, if you're like most Americans, chances are your 17-year-old self was absolutely correct.
As it turns out, less than a quarter of U.S. workers report using math any more complicated than basic fractions and percentages during the course of their jobs. The graphs below are based on survey data compiled by Northeastern University sociologist Michael Handel. Handel surveyed about 2,300 workers first from 2004 through 2006, then again between 2007 and 2009. The catchall category of "any more advanced" math includes algebra through calculus. And as you can see, most workers aren't doing a whole lot of high-level computations.
You might be surprised by who's doing the most advanced math day-to-day. It's not white-collar workers. Rather, it's high-skill blue-collar workers, shown in dark blue on the graph below. Before you glance over it, here's a breakdown of jobs categories:
Upper level white collar, e.g. management, technical, and professional occupations
Low level white collar, e.g. clerical and sales workers
Upper level blue collar, e.g. craft and repair workers like skilled construction trades and mechanics
Lower level blue collar, e.g. factory workers and truck drivers
These numbers alone aren't an open and shut case against teaching complex math to most high school students. But they do suggest that what we teach today has little relationship to the broad demands of the job market, and that we should at least be conscious of the possibility that we're putting educational road blocks in front of students without a practical application for them.
At the same time, it's clear that some of the best blue-collar jobs do in fact require a level of mathematical literacy on par with what you'd expect a student to know if they were college bound. To me, that hints at an argument for more high level vocational programs: It might help if students actually knew that those boring equations really one day would earn them a paycheck.
There is a hypothesis—out of favor now, but it had its heyday—that the universe was cyclical. Big Bang, expansion, slowing, stopping, shrinking, Big Crunch … and then kaboom, another Big Bang, and here we go again.
Art imitates life. The TV show Futurama exploded in to the geek community, rose in popularity, then was canceled. Then it was reborn, only to be canceled again. And then for a second time it was reborn from its ashes.
But this cycle may be the last. Perhaps it’s entropy. Perhaps it’s a network executive who thinks Scruffy hits too close to home. Whatever the underlying mechanism, Futurama has seen its last cosmic expansion. It’s been canceled again. Again. And probably for no raisin.
To say I love Futurama is like saying Nibbler loves to eat, and that Popplers are tasty. How often do you get a geeky, hugely scientifically based cartoon that is also incrediblyfunny? And it wasn’t just funny, it was smart. But that’s no surprise, given that executive producer David X. Cohen has degrees in both physics and computational science. Many of the writers had degrees in science and math, and that was reflected in the show.
Not that is was all science all the time. When was the last time an animated show made you cry? If you answer “never,” then you have either never seen “Jurassic Bark,” or you have had your soul surgically removed. Chunks of granite weep openly at the end of that episode.
Over its long run, Futurama has had way too many incredible scientific joke and plot points to point out individually. It is one of the few TV shows to actually respect the edicts of time travel. (Heck, it set up a massive later time travel plot line in the opening scene of the pilot.) It featured black holes, exploding stars, galactic governments, and more.
But if I had to pick one that idea laser-focused itself directly into my brain, it would be from “The Late Philip J. Fry”. The basic plot line is that mad scientist Professor Farnsworth invents a time machine but it has no reverse: It can only travel into the future. Fry, Farnsworth, and the robot Bender wind up going ever farther into the distant future. And when they do, what they find is surprisingly scientifically accurate.
They travel to the year one billion, where the Earth is a scorched desert. This is predicted by stellar astrophysics: The sun is slowly getting hotter. You wouldn’t notice day by day, or even century by century, but over tens of millions of years it makes a difference. In about a billion years, the sun will be about 10 percent brighter, enough to raise the Earth’s temperature 10 degrees F. The Earth will cook.
They jump forward again, this time to the year 1 x 1035. Professor Farnsworth notes this is the time when all matter will cease to exist, and again, that’s about right: A current idea is that protons themselves, a constituent of essentially all normal matter, can spontaneously decay. The process is agonizingly slow and may very well take as long as Farnsworth noted. Give or take a factor of 10 or 100 in the age of the universe, but after that point in time, all matter will have disintegrated into a thin, ethereal soup.
Finally, though, as they watch from inside the time machine, a second Big Bang occurs, forming a universe identical to this one. They keep moving forward in time and wind up stopping at precisely the moment they left (more or less, but … spoilers).
I practically vibrated out of my chair watching this episode. I wrote a book, “Death from the Skies!”, which describes all this in detail. I never was able to find out, but I have to wonder if any of the writes of Futurama read it …
Some died slow deaths. Others went into convulsions. Tens of thousands yet to be born were at risk of permanent damage. Lead paint initially seemed harmless. The lead pigment that lent color and texture to the oil that formed its base made up as much as 70 percent of a can of paint. As little as a thumbnail-sized chip, though, could send kids into convulsions. But that didn't mean anyone was doing anything. And there was a reason.
Since the 1920s, the lead industry had organized to fight bans, restrictions, even warnings on paint-can labels. It had marketed the deadly product to children and parents, spreading the lie that lead paint was safe. For decades, paint ads appeared in the Saturday Evening Post, Good Housekeeping, National Geographic, and other national magazines and local newspapers. Coloring books were handed out to children. The industry even sent Dutch Boy costumes to children on Halloween, and printed coloring books that showed children how to prepare it.
The lead industry even claimed that the problem was not with the paint but with the "uneducable Negro and Puerto Rican" parents who "failed" to stop children from placing their fingers and toys in their mouths.
When public health officials in New York, Baltimore, and Chicago tried to enact regulations in the 1950s that threatened the industry's interests, lobbyists visited legislators and governors to get restrictions lifted. They succeeded. When Baltimore's health department called for the removal of lead from paint, the industry countered by proposing and winning a "voluntary" standard, reducing the lead content in paint. When New York City's health department proposed a warning label saying that the product was poisonous to children, the industry rejected the "poison" label and lobbied successfully for another label that simply advised parents not to use it on "toys, furniture, or interior surfaces that might be chewed by children," and deliberately avoided mentioning that lead paint was poisonous. It hired public relations firms to plan out strategies to forestall threats to the lead market.
The lead industry even sought to place the blame for lead poisoning epidemic on parents and children, claiming that the problem was not with the lead paint but with the "uneducable Negro and Puerto Rican" parents who "failed" to stop children from placing their fingers and toys in their mouths. Children poisoned by lead, the industry claimed, had a disease that led them to suck on "unnatural objects" and thereby get poisoned.
But the industry wouldn't remove all lead from their products. It fought every attempt at regulation. Industry representatives threatened lawsuits against television stations such as CBS that aired popular shows like Highway Patrol in which the product was depicted as dangerous ... All this despite records that show that the industry knew that their product was poisoning children.
Does this playbook sound familiar? To anyone who has been following the furious efforts of the soda industry to counter public health initiatives to limit consumption of their product, it should. As it should to anyone familiar with the history of the tobacco industry's efforts to deny the obvious. As with all such comparisons when it comes to the food industry, an initial caveat is essential: lead and tobacco were known to be lethal.
But in all these cases, industry presents the problem simply as a matter of choice and then blames consumers for not taking simple precautions to protect themselves: smokers who don't quit; parents who don't supervise their children and "let" them eat lead paint; people who simply have no idea of moderation or the importance of physical activity.
In the case of lead paint, after three decades of industry lobbying, propaganda, and denial of danger, local health departments began to assert themselves. In 1949, Maryland's House of Delegates passed a bill banning the use of lead paint on children's toys and furniture -- a law that was repealed under industry pressure the following year. A few years later, the City of Baltimore health department required a warning label be placed on paint cans. Then, in 1959, the New York City Board of Health prohibited the use of paint containing more than one percent lead on interior surfaces.
It is the responsibility of public health departments to protect us from health dangers, regardless of the biological mechanism.
Other major cities followed suit. Slowly, the number of children facing brain damage began to decline. In 1971, the federal government banned lead-based paints on public housing. Finally, in 1978, nearly two decades after the actions of local departments of health, the federal government banned the use of lead in virtually any paint intended for sale to consumers.
In recent years, New York City's Board of Health has tried to stem the obesity epidemic. New York became the first city in the nation to require that calorie counts accompany food items in fast food restaurants. And, of course, the Board of Health recently tried to limit the size of soda servings.
As with the earlier attempts to regulate lead paint, the affected industries have combined in a furious campaign that has transformed the public's understanding of the city's efforts.
Soda manufacturers, restaurants, movie chain operators, and their allies have tried to convince us that this effort is an attack on our personal freedom: on billboards and signs the industry proclaims that we should not let government "bureaucrats" tell us how much we can drink. Further, the industry has worked its hardest to introduce doubt over the link between obesity, diabetes, and the amount of sugar consumed, arguing that there is significant scientific uncertainty and controversy. Finally, the industry has argued that the soda industry and certain types of stores are being "unfairly" singled out.
Supreme Court Justice Milton Tingling accepted much of the industry's argument, arguing that the Board of Health did not have the authority to limit sugary drink container sizes and that the ban was "arbitrary" and "capricious" because not all stores were included in the ban. But the New York City Board of Health is firmly established in the City Charter with the specific role of protecting the City's residents from all health threats -- not just infectious ones.
Demanding that all scientific questions be answered and all aspects of a rule be completely consistent before regulations are put in place is a frightening requirement -- one that, if upheld, would put an end to most public health activities. As with lead poisoning, obesity is an issue that is generating hundreds of studies, and will keep generating them in the coming years. If we have to wait for scientists to reach a consensus about all aspects of the obesity epidemic and other chronic disease threats, we will find our public health departments paralyzed and our health threatened. It is the responsibility of public health departments to protect us from health dangers, regardless of the biological mechanism.
We still have children suffering from lead's effects, but at least kids no longer convulse and die. If the New York City Board of Health had not banned the sale of lead paint in 1959, we would have experienced more generations of children with lead-caused severe brain damage. Whatever the legal niceties are regarding "what is an epidemic," the reality is that we will be sacrificing a generation of children to the consequences of obesity if health agencies don't begin to take action.
Just thinking about trying to maneuver a sofa up the stairs, around the bannisters and through the doorway is enough to give even the sanest, strongest person the cold sweats. Generally, the same qualities that make couches ideal for lounging--generous depth, cushy heft--render them complete and total nightmares to transport. Even for those that arrive flat-packed, it’s likely that at some point you’re going to have to relocate the damn things, fully-formed, and that process will involve cursing and stubbed toes and pinched fingers. No fun.
Which is why Industrial Facility’s Wireframe series for Herman Miller is not only good looking--it’s also incredibly considerate; Sam Hecht and Kim Colin designed the collection with agility top of mind. "We wanted something that was visually light, that spoke of the contemporary conditions of moving a sofa from one position to another, and having to pass it through a small door frame,” Hecht explains in a release (which also charmingly acknowledges that “these conditions are strange inspirational starting points”). The super thin steel geometry of the structure, which comes in black or white, acts as a kind of oversized basket for the cushions; as a bonus Ikea-style convenience, the upholstered covers are removable--read: easily washable--and available in any of Herman Miller’s myriad fabric options.
The pieces also represent an interesting industry crossover for the brand, which transplanted a springy suspension that was first developed for Herman Miller’s healthcare line, (Core77 notes (it was first found in theNala Patient Chair). The Sofas come in two- and three-seaters, and a lounge chair and ottoman round out the set that aims to be not only comfortable to sit in, but comfortable to transport when it’s time to move house.
You might be surprised by who's doing the most advanced math day-to-day. It's not white-collar workers. Rather, it's high-skill blue-collar workers, shown in dark blue on the graph below. Before you glance over it, here's a breakdown of jobs categories:
These numbers alone aren't an open and shut case against teaching complex math to most high school students. But they do suggest that what we teach today has little relationship to the broad demands of the job market, and that we should at least be conscious of the possibility that we're putting educational road blocks in front of students without a practical application for them.
