Commenter “destructure” wrote on Lion of the Blogoshphere’s blog:

 blacks with an IQ of 100 actually earn the same as others with an IQ of 100. That’s fine. However, blacks with an IQ of 120 earn more on average than others with an IQ of 120. And I’m not sure why upper middle class blacks should be getting affirmative action when they’re already earning more money than others.

Lion responded:

Totally makes sense because a black with an IQ of 120 will get accepted to a better college, get affirmative-action hired into a better career, than a white with the same IQ. But what’s the source for that factoid?

On the other hand, if high IQ blacks overperform their white counterparts economically, we’d expect more black billionaires. At yet despite being 13% of America, blacks have never been even 1% of the Forbes 400 richest Americans list and are sometimes only 0.25%. By contrast Jews are arguably 36% of the Forbes 400 despite being only 2% of America (though exact stats depend on how Jews are counted).

I decided to use my celebrity status to reach out to the World’s most influential social scientist, Charles Murray, since his book Human Diversity found that even controlling for IQ, white Americans are more prosperous than black Americans, though less so than Asian Americans (at least among Generation Y thirty somethings). With respect to high IQ blacks in particular, Murray replied:

But if high IQ blacks benefit from affirmative action, why doesn’t that translate into economic benefits? One possibility is that affirmative action devalues black credentials. For example Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas was overlooked by dozens of law firms despite having one of the most prestigious law degrees in the country. Another possibility is that whatever edge blacks get from affirmative action is negated by racism.

On the other hand, if America is still racist, why do Asian Americans earn 157% as much as their IQ matched white counterparts according to Murray’s book? Perhaps because they work much harder than whites do while experiencing much less racism than blacks do (at least prior to the coronavirus pandemic).

It’s also worth noting that whatever advantage Asian Americans have in regular income has not yet showed up among the Forbes 400 suggesting that hard work only goes so far.