[dsfyu404ed]

>Many Americans are illiterate on numbers and the economy too

Many more pretend to be less literate than they are for ideological reasons.

>still remember the classic example that a burger chain released a 1/3 pound burger to compete with another chain's 1/4 pound burger, and many people thought the 1/4 pound was bigger.

This trope needs to be taken out back and shot. It wasn't that people didn't get it. It's that it was poorly marketed and the difference between 1/3 and 1/4 isn't enough to make people go to a burger chain that was dying due to low and variable quality when they could just go to McDicks and get a reliable 1/4lb.

[giantg2]

There's certainly more than just the number confusion, but I specifically remember the case study we were looking at included a survey where a sizeable number of respondents said 1/4 was bigger than 1/3.

[moron4hire]

I don't know anything about this particular one, but just because it's a case study in a textbook doesn't mean it's true. There are lots of untruths that get propagated long after they've been debunked.

[dcow]

But they’re citing a survey where people literally didn’t get it. That, if not made up, factually supports the claim that some people really do think 1/3 is less than 1/4.

I really liked the 1/3 pound “thickburgers”. I don’t think it was just some dying chain trying to spread rumors about how stupid people didn't understand their marketing and that’s why they “died” (they’re still very much alive last I checked).

[andsoitis]

> But they’re citing a survey

Then it should be possible to point to said survey…

[dcow]

If you had the survey in hand you could point to it. Proprietary information is not news and exists even in academia (cf. scihub).

[giantg2]

Sure, but there's nothing presented to debunk this so far. So far all the "testimony" shows it to be true, but it could be propaganda.

The larger point is that it does demonstrate what the actual data shows - that the US has a sizable portion not good at math/fractions or finance.