| There are a lot of potential reasons, a lot of them political landmines. For example, race makes a difference (of course, this is probably because of SES/education differences, but still) - and the top ten are heavily white, while the bottom ten have large minority populations. A lot of the top states are also among the wealthiest, and a lot of the bototm states are among the poorest - this matters, too. Also, a lot of the states in the bottom ten have large foreign-born populations. If the not-too-proud history of IQ testing - in which non-native speakers performed poorly on IQ tests that were written in English and it was concluded, based on this, that the scores reflected a lack of intelligence (rather than the inability to read English) - is any indication, then perhaps this can account for some of these scores, too. |
United States Wealthiest 
MLB .400 Hitters 
Elements by State Abbreviation
