This post is not meant for politically correct egalitarians who believe that everyone can be an Aristotle, a Goethe or a Michael Jackson through hard work.
Source:
https://steemit.com/education/@chhaylin/are-too-many-people-going-to-college-a-look-at-iq-distributions-tells-us-why-this-is-the-case
"We have to ask ourselves what percentage of the population have the mental capacity required to understand college material. This percentage, I think, is significantly lower than the percentage of people that are pursuing a college degree.
The average IQ of the population is 100. It is very difficult to obtain a college degree with an IQ of 100. If you are mentally average, you can understand some simple algebra in maths, but you will have difficulties with differential calculus. This is no life-devastating deficit. You are still intelligent enough to perform well for hundreds of jobs, but you will likely be unable to succeed in gaining a college degree. It is possible for the student to attend Macro Economics 1 classes with an IQ of 100-110, to read the textbooks and to do the tests. However, the student will probably only take in a hodgepodge of ideas.
There is no magic IQ number with which a person can go through a reasonably good college education, but an IQ of around 110 is quite problematic for most college degrees. College majors differ in difficulty level. I looked into the IQ distribution of different majors and have found that the majors that have the highest average IQ scores are:
Physics & Astronomy (133)
Mathematical Sciences (130)
Philosophy (129)
Materials Engineering (129)
Economics (128)
Chemical Engineering (128)
Other Engineering (128)
Mechanical Engineering (126)
This would put the average college student in the above majors (almost) acceptable for Mensa – the high IQ organization that only accepts people within the highest 2 percentiles (IQ of around 132).
The majors with the lowest average IQ scores are:
Administration (107)
Home Economics (106)
Special (106)
Student Counseling (105)
Early Childhood (104)
Social Work (103)
If we assume that a college degree requires an average IQ of 110-115, then it would be reasonable, looking at the IQ distribution of the population, to assume that around 15% of the population should pursue a college degree.
If you stretch it somewhat, maybe 25%. However, at the moment 45% of everyone above the age of 30 has a college degree.