What happened?

Two centuries ago, if you couldn't read and shoveled shit for a living, you knew that Tom Jefferson and Johnny Adams belonged in charge of stuff because they were smart. One century ago, the horse cart had been replaced by a motorized truck, but there were still enough horses around to have to shovel their shit. More people could read, but a majority hadn't finished high school, so they realized that Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson were more educated and should be in charge.

Fast forward to today. No one shovels shit, it all flows in sewage lines to the sewage treatment plant. A majority of the voting public has attended some college, and with a few more years, they too could be like Sarah Palin and graduate. When people hear Robert Reich or Paul Krugman or Joseph Stiglitz talk, they ask "if they are so smart, how come they aren't rich like Warren Buffett?" So because everyone thinks they know what is going on, you get exactly the effect Dunning and Kruger are pointing out.

People who fuck up badly need to go back to shoveling actual, stinky shit, on a pig farm preferably. People like Larry Summers, Phil Gramm, Paul Wolfowitz, Hank Paulson, Donald Rumfilled, and I'll even include Eric Holder.

1820-1860, average. anyone from 1865-1900, below average. 1920-1929, below average. Nixon, below average, Regan, below average. Bush I-II, way below average. ( For presidents )

Every once in a while we get an exceptional one, but for the most part, slightly above average.

The Republicans have been picking below average for a while now.

Democrats fit the curve. Kerry, average, etc..

And most of the time at the state and local level. We didn't turn into a corporotocracy instantly....

Racial and sexual discrimination were ingrained into our government. I don't think those times should be considered smarter than our current era.

I wonder what they would say about their own competency?

which is why there is such widespread agreement the Republicans are screwed for president, this year.

Everyone thinks they are above average. American society's fear, dislike, and even hatred of "The Expert" makes this even worse. American anti-intellectual egalitarianism is based on the stupid being envious of the abilities of the intelligent. Anti-intellectualism and meritocracy cannot co-exist.

A systemic thinker is one who is capable of perceiving the interactions and relationships of patterns in society, and who given that can weigh a given candidate on the basis of how well they will move the system overall to function in a manner consistent with the voter's beliefs and mores - which means choosing a candidate who is able to think both strategically and tactically, who is willing to do what's necessary for the broader good, and who is well informed . A hierarchical thinker on the other hand is one who will choose a leader on the basis of their charisma, adherence to that thinker's dogma, and decisiveness. Both parties have both types of thinkers, though in general you find conservatives tend to be considerably more hierarchical in their perceptions than progressives.

Systemic thinkers tend to be introverts - they internalize their thinking and emotional interactions, often preferring to mull things over, and are usually both more perceptive of the strengths and weaknesses of others and are more aware of the strengths and weaknesses of themselves. Hierarchical thinkers are extroverts. They are happiest when interacting with other people, usually tend not to test their own internal beliefs and often tend to have an inflated sense of their own discernment and worth. Not surprisingly, STs tend towards analytic fields - engineers, scientists, teachers, programmers, librarians, writers, bureaucrats, fine artists. HTs tend to become business owners and managers, salesmen, marketers, politicians, lawyers, police, soldiers. This isn't absolute, of course - there are systemic politicians and hierarchical programmers, for instance, but as a general trend it holds remarkably well.

75%-80% of the population in the US are extroverts. This means that 3 of every 4 people tend to be more fixated upon personality and decisiveness than on intelligence and deliberation. Of the extroverts, roughly half are extremely hierarchical - they are strongly influenced by their perceived leaders on the hierarchy, believe that the best leaders are the ones which most closely match their ideology and who are most consistent in their beliefs. That's why people like Santorum are catching fire with that particular population, and why Ron Paul is still in the race.

The irony is that Mitt Romney is a fairly classic introvert, but he's trying to appeal to a very extroverted base, and they distrust him intensely. Obama is also a classic introvert, but his base is much more introverted itself. The Dems in general are fairly critical of Obama, but this is typical of Dems - they are more likely to look at the broader picture, and will support a man more because they believe that his actions are in the main moving in the right direction, even if there are individual decisions they disagree with.

'people always assess their own performance as "above average"'

this is actually an oversimplification/misstatement of the findings as a whole.

The real problem is that the incompetent, especially the completely incompetent, blithely skate through not even knowing there's a discipline whose rules they are violating. They judge themselves above average because they don't know what to look for to distinguish their performance from good performance.

Good performers, on the other hand, tend to UNDERestimate their own performance, partially because they are judging themselves against the highest standards of the discipline, which they usually know well, often assessing their superior performance as BELOW average.

The end result is that if someone tells you they're good at something, you can't trust them. Being able to tell you what is good and not-good about their work, or other work, is a better indicator of success.

Read the original paper (Unskilled and Unaware) as a pdf, from Cornell

the more one thinks one knows and the less one wants to know. The more one knows the less one knows one knows and the more one wants to know.

And as a corollary skill, the ability to discern trends, and extrapolate data.