Thunderbrd
C2C War Dog
You couldn't have chosen two examples that exemplify this thesis further. China was running at a fairly low average education level for some time and is only beginning to bring that up but if it does bring it up too much it runs the danger of opening up the door for revolution (which we'll figure out better how to express later) but the point is - the onset of communism really introduced the need to limit the educational exposure which in turn caused fertility rates to go up which they must address now by imposing brutal means of restricting birth rates (which would sure make for an interesting civic!)
That restriction is a direct attack on the birth rate problem they would otherwise have - they MUST reduce their population because they've overgrown their means and many live in poverty (though the free trade has brought them a lot of economic recovery, they still require it to maintain healthy economic growth and even with it they are looking a little shaky at the moment.)
Thus, China is a perfect example of low education leading to high birth rates leading to overpopulation which they have elected to attempt to control with even more brutal means which they can get away with because of the reduced education levels.
On the flip side of the coin you bring up Japan which is a perfect opposite scenario. You say how the Japanese are voluntarily having trouble keeping up their birth rates so as to sustain their population (which arguably isn't a terrible thing for their space limited island nation that could use a bit of population reduction if it wasn't such a bad thing for their westernized economic structure that is, like all western economies, based on a ponzy scheme that requires population growth to enable infinite economic growth...)
Japan is also one of the most (if not THE most) well educated nations on Earth with extremely high average universal and aptitude testing scores among its students. They are not implementing any policy which would limit the population growth of their nation yet the population is pretty much stalled out (or even shrinking which is something our game's pop growth modifiers can't represent without affecting food directly which doesn't seem quite right either because the civ pop growth model is inherently flawed from go by basing it directly on food. But at least we can get it somewhat closer to a realistic model.)
Point being -
Japan: Extremely high average education level, very low to non-existent pop growth rate.
China: Must instil tight and brutal controls over population growth and this is in part due to a somewhat under the curve average education level.
The model I'm proposing matches reality quite nicely here as well as revealing to us where some interesting new civics could bring us into even more accuracy.
Your point about people being lower educated based on observations of game shows is, while rather non-scientifically derived as there will ALWAYS be a segment of the population that is personally under the average education level, probably quite astute. When you compare it to fairly recent history anyhow.
My statement was made to compare the US education levels between now and say... the Middle Ages. Gotta admit... still much higher now than it would've been then. Even considering that education represents how much information the average of all citizens have absorbed the amount of knowledge available in that era. Peasants were kept VERY stupidly uneducated to the point that the average Caveman would've easily known more about the world and life than they did despite their overall pool of societal knowledge being much lower.
But yes... America is being dumbed down in tons of ways - all very subtle. Education systems are taxed, the less intelligent are breeding more often (which has a genetic impact on IQ), our sources of entertainment are growing more and more basal by the day and our news media blasts us with lies and propaganda every moment it airs and since the vast majority BELIEVE the BS, the lies become the accepted truth. Yeah, America's getting stupid these days.
But let's pause to consider what this means from a National Management perspective... have you considered that we may NEED to be a little less educated so that we will be less likely to resist the actions and agendas that power sources in the government would like to take? If you're running a democratic society, there's not much room for error in convincing your public that you're always making decisions with their best interests in mind - if they are stupider they are easier to convince of this when you, as a National Leader (or in our case a ruling body), slyly go about to conquer and conquest for personal financial gains, villainizing our 'enemies' in the public eye quite successfully no matter how innocent and willing to work for peace they may be.
Taking this model into the game, in preparation for additional conflicts, the enhanced birth rate certainly doesn't hurt to add fuel for troop recruitment does it? Particularly when (in our model) volunteer army accessed recruitment centers will reduce the birth rate to compensate for the recruiting process.
Since all research and evidence backs my proposal as well as a hung jury, I feel compelled to implement the changes as charted here. I adjusted the color of the revolution adjustment to indicate I've omitted it but still feel it's going to be important to implement in some form, based on a civic-education comparison. This will take some more thought on how to best implement - and perhaps happiness will be a key way to go about it too but I see some contradictions with generic happiness based on civic-education levels so I'm going to take some more time to consider that factor.
I've also made the population growth factor perhaps too weak in comparison to the food adjustment factor that counteracts it either way you go with education levels so that may require further tweaking later. For now, due to the 'hung jury' I'll implement this weaker version and perhaps we'll see to increasing or decreasing the impact later.
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