Gregory Clark: belief

Transcript context

…It can’t be genetic because it’s fairly recent. So, it’s cultural. The culture has this big, huge influence. But there’s been a lot of selective migration within the UK. This new book says the growth of the South and the decline of the North is all attributable to self-selection within Britain. Glasgow, where I come from, has had a huge amount of out-migration. Out-migration — it tends to be people with more talent, ability, stuff like that, are the ones who are on the move. So, what you’re actually seeing, I think, is that a lot of this is selective migration of people. My sister trained as a doctor in Glasgow, and when they interviewed patients, they were actually trained to ask them, “How much do you drink per day? Ten pints?” People would say, “Oh, no, doctor, only six.” [laughs] In some sense, you might say that’s some cultural hangover in terms of people’s attitude to things like drinking and exercise and vegetables. What’s your take, then, on modern Ireland? There’re incredibly high rates of out-migration, and I don’t just mean the potato famine, just Irish going to Liverpool. America, Australia, all over. You look at Ireland today — it doesn’t seem selection is that important. Their education level is the highest in Western Europe. Health indicators, income, whatever test you want to run, they just seem like normal Ireland. So, selection there hasn’t mattered? Or what should I infer?…

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