The Trillion Dollar IQ Business and The Future of the Smarts - Rich Karlgaard:Forbes
Friday, September 10, 2010 at 03:04PM At an August 6, 2010 conference in Lake Tahoe, the richest and smartest guy in the room, Bill Gates, offered his opinion on the next big thing. Ready? Toilets. All kinds of toilets. Broadband biffies that email PSA counts to your doctor. Do-gooder dumpers that save water in the third world. “[Toilets are] one of the greatest under investments,” Gates effused. “Not much money goes into that. You end up with the low IQ guys on the toilets.” If you know Gates — I once spent 5 days on the road with him — you’ll know he uses the term, IQ, a lot. Gates has always loved IQ. He loves it like a football coach loves 40-yard-dash speed. It never seems to occur to Gates that IQ has become a politically incorrect subject for many. Some 30% of American colleges have made the SAT test — a rough proxy for IQ — optional in the admissions process. Where the SAT is still considered, Asian and east Indian enrollment has soared.