[Reading-hall-of-fame] $2.2 trillion gain if overcome adult illiteracy

[Thomas Sticht]

Colleagues:  While looking for information about November as National
Family Literacy Month I came across some interesting statements about
illiteracy and literacy in the United States. The first thing that caught
my eye was from Forbes magazine online with the bold headline: “*Low
Literacy Levels Among U.S. Adults Could Be Costing The Economy $2.2
Trillion A Year”*! The article went on to say: “Sep 9, 2020 — According to
the *U.S.* Department of Education, 54% of *U.S.* adults 16-74 years old -
about *130 million* people - lack proficiency in literacy, ...( see online
at:
https://forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2020/09/09/low-literacy-levels-among-us-adults-could-be-costing-the-economy-22-trillion-a-year/?sh=2d7634974c90
).

 The claim that some 130 million adults lack proficiency in literacy
reminded me of an earlier news headline from the Washington Post in 1993
stating about U.S. adults: LITERACY OF 90 MILLION IS DEFICIENT (Online at:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1993/09/09/literacy-of-90-million-is-deficient/df715ccd-f90b-44e8-8235-f527dde32297/

I then recalled that almost a decade later, in 2001, the Washington Post
ran an article headlined     *Adult Illiteracy,  Rewritten*  in which it
was reported that the 90 million deficient in literacy number was based on
faulty use of a “response probability” and greatly exaggerated the numbers
of adults called deficient in literacy, or, as this quickly got popularized
as “illiterate”. (Archived online with a new headline at:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2001/07/17/millions-of-adults-illiterate-no-more/ac1067cb-9fdd-499b-a4bc-8713fc5a9063/

Now a new report conducted by the Gallup organization and sponsored by the
Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy has led to media reports, like
that by Forbes cited above, claiming that millions of U.S. adults are
“illiterate”.  The new report (Rothwell, 2020) is available on the web site
for the Barbara Bush Foundation and is titled “*Assessing the Economic
Gains of Eradicating Illiteracy Nationally and Regionally in the United
States” *When I went to the web site I was somewhat surprised to find a
banner statement on the front page of the site stating: *Literacy is the
key to solving healthcare, poverty, crime rates, unemployment, everything!*

 Using data from the levels of literacy developed for the Program for the
International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) and the U.S.
Department of Education’s combined individual PIAAC data from 2012 to 2017
to create estimated literacy levels for every U.S. county, the report
states:

 “This report defines illiteracy as a lack of proficiency on the PIAAC, an
internationally validated literacy exam. Adults who score below Level 3 for
literacy are not considered proficient and are defined as at least
partially illiterate in this study. Adults below or at Level-1 literacy may
struggle to understand texts beyond filling out basic forms. Drawing
inferences or combining multiple sources of texts is likely too difficult.
Adults at Level 2 can read well enough to evaluate product reviews and
perform other tasks that require comparisons and simple inferences, but
they are unlikely to correctly evaluate the reliability of texts or draw
sophisticated inferences. Adults at Level 3 and above are considered fully
literate in this study. They can reliably evaluate sources, as well as
infer sophisticated meaning and complex ideas from written sources.”

Using these data the report states: “*Eradicating illiteracy would have
enormous economic benefits. *This analysis finds that getting all U.S.
adults to at least a [PIAAC] Level 3 of literacy proficiency would generate
an additional $2.2 trillion in annual income for the country. That is 10%
of the gross domestic product.”

For those interested in this report on illiteracy, whether whole or
partial, from the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy the reference
is:

Rothwell, J. (2020). Assessing the Economic Gains of Eradicating Illiteracy
Nationally and Regionally in the United States. Available online at:
https://www.barbarabush.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/BBFoundation_GainsFromEradicatingIlliteracy_9_8.pdf

Following several years after the 1993 report that some 90 million adults
were lacking in literacy, funding and enrollments in the Adult Education
and Literacy System (AELS) made up with funding from the federal Workforce
Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) and state sources, rose up to 1998
when the National Reporting System was implemented and since then while
funding has risen (but not enough to overcome inflation) enrollments have
plummeted by over 2.5 million from around 4.0 million in 1998 to around 1.3
million or fewer now.

It will be interesting to see where this new initiative by the Barbara Bush
Foundation for Family Literacy leads.

Tom Sticht
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.nottingham.ac.uk/pipermail/reading-hall-of-fame/attachments/20211025/a8f3e145/attachment.html>