| This dissertation draws on literature in empirical psychology, behavioral economics, and Austrian economics to make the case that intelligence and education are strong predictors of belief, and belief is a strong predictor of policy preferences. The three primary arguments are: (1) An important function of education is to provide heuristics to deal with complex and abundant information; (2) Intelligence is as strong a predictor of economic beliefs as education, if not stronger; (3) The "Civic Returns" to education have been largely overstated in the existing empirical literature from both Economics and Political Science. |
