The Power of One

Good news for anyone surrounded by nerds: Being part of a group, and particularly a country, that's smarter by even one IQ point can improve your quality of life.

...1 percent more cooperation

When researchers ask groups to make either cooperative or selfish decisions, every additional IQ point in the group results in a 1 percent increase in the likelihood of a cooperative choice. Garett Jones, who analyzed these results, says more intelligent people tend to be more willing to delay gratification.

...1 percent raise

For each additional point in the national IQ of their country of origin, immigrants to the United States earn 1 percent more per year, according to a study by Garett Jones and Joel Schneider. National IQ is not immutable; it can rise with improved public health, education, and nutrition.

...an extra $810 per year

By age 35, every IQ point you're lording over your sibling earns you $810 more each year, says a 2002 study by Charles Murray of the conservative American Enterprise Institute. Murray studied siblings to control for genetic and familial variability in an attempt to isolate the effect of IQ alone.

...6.2 percent fewer tickets

In pre-2003 New York, when diplomats were not punished for unpaid parking tickets, each additional point in their country's IQ meant 6.2 percent fewer unpaid tickets. The finding squares with other research showing that high-IQ countries have lower levels of corruption.

...a $468 GDP bump

A recent Psychological Science paper reported that every one-point edge in the average IQ of the smartest 5 percent of a nation correlates with an extra $468 in per capita GDP. The same advantage in overall national IQ added less than half that.