Another Rationale For Affirmative Action Collapses
Another Rationale For Affirmative Action Collapses
Last year, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against Affirmative Action, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown, who was selected by President Biden largely because she was a black woman, dissented. In her dissent, Justice Brown referred to a study that claimed that black newborns were more likely to survive in the care of black physicians than white ones.
Skeptical researchers finally go their hands on the data used in that study, and it turns out it was misleading. In short, the black infants who had the most serious conditions, such as extremely low birth weight, were referred to specialists who were more likely to be white. One of the best scientific accounts on X, Cremieux Recueil, broke down the details in a thread last week. I've post that thread in full below.
Following that, we'll close with a quick trading update.
So if you don't recall, here's how Justice Jackson described the original study's findings.
— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) September 16, 2024
She was wrong to describe it this way, because she mixed up percentage points with percentages, and she's referring to the uncontrolled rather than the fully-controlled effect. pic.twitter.com/c6JFwdKwj8
If you look across all of the paper's models, you see that all the results are borderline significant at best, and usually just-nonsignificant, which is a sign of methodological tomfoolery and results that are likely fragile.
— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) September 16, 2024
With all that said, I recommended ignoring the paper. pic.twitter.com/NusSPhlvJJ
So, first thing:
— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) September 16, 2024
(A) At very low birthweights, babies have higher mortality rates, and they're similar across baby races;
(B) At very low birthweights, babies have higher mortality rates, and they're similar across physician races. pic.twitter.com/ekw6kXQlUk
Third thing:
— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) September 16, 2024
(A) Black babies with high birthweights disproportionately go to Black doctors;
(B) The Black babies sent to White doctors disproportionately have very low birthweights. pic.twitter.com/CY89uY3RCZ
At this point, we have to ask ourselves why the original study didn't control for birthweight. One sentence in the original paper suggests the authors knew it was a potential issue, but they still failed to control for it. pic.twitter.com/7pic9md5BF
— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) September 16, 2024
Ultimately, we have ourselves yet another case of PNAS publishing highly popular rubbish and it taking far too long to get it corrected.
— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) September 16, 2024
Let me preregister something else:
The original paper will continue to be cited more than the correction with the birthweight control.
They'll continue doing that even though they're wrong.
— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) September 16, 2024
To learn more and to find the article linked, check out my post on this: https://t.co/ZroxSGhRGe
A Quick Trading Update
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This one's on a stock with rock-solid fundamentals that dropped double digits after beating on top and bottom lines when it reported earnings last month. We waited for the share price to consolidate on this one, to avoid catching a falling knife.
The options market predicts a move of about $30 in either direction after it reports earnings again this fall. We're betting on a ~$25 move to the upside. If we're right, we can make a >200% gain on this one; if we're wrong, our max loss will be 100%. So it's a heads we win 2x, tails we lose x sort of trade.
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