The Ascent of Man

According to The Economist, studies show good-looking people also have higher IQs.

This goes against popular wisdom: beauty is only skin deep, you can’t judge a book by its cover, and so forth. In fact, though, people do rather well in guessing who is and is not intelligent from photographs. Popular wisdom here, I think, is only wishful thinking. People want to believe that any exceptional talent in one direction is matched by a deficit in another. That makes the rest of us feel better. Hence the popular notion that beautiful women are stupid (“dumb blondes”) and that handsome men are twits or empty suits; or, conversely, that bright men are geeky and uncoordinated. Doesn't make it so.

In fact, the studies’ results are entirely unsurprising. It’s what Darwin would have predicted. If you’re smart, so long as beauty is valued in your culture, you’re more likely than average to find a way to catch a better-looking mate. The kids, over the generations, will then tend to be both smart and good-looking. Conversely, if you’re beautiful, you have a better chance of snagging a smart mate, so long as that too is valued.

The Economist reports that good-looking people are also more successful in their careers. The uglier you are, the lower your pay is likely to be. This is no surprise, and may not even imply discrimination against the ugly, if attractiveness is linked to intelligence. More surprising is that the difference in income caused by beauty is greater for men than for women: the ugliest man earns 14% less than the best-looking, while the ugliest woman earns only 10% less than the most beautiful. This despite the fact that we value beauty more in a woman than a man.

What could explain this? These figures suggest that there is greater competition for a good income among men than among women. Either it is harder for a man than a woman to get a good job, or else it is more important to their survival for a man than a woman to get a good job, or both.

This, too, is predictable. But it implies pretty clearly that we are discriminating against men.