We Are All Getting Dumber... Some Faster Than Others

TL;DR

Frictionless technology and AI are measurably reversing decades of rising intelligence, hitting lower-income populations hardest while markets have no incentive to stop it.

Key Points

• 1.The Flynn Effect has reversed for the first time in measurable history. IQ rose ~3 points per decade throughout the 20th century, but since the mid-2000s, Norway, Denmark, Finland, the UK, France, Germany, and the Netherlands have all reported it stalling or reversing — and US math scores hit their first-ever recorded drop.
• 2.Frictionless technology removes the struggle that builds capability. Buy-now-pay-later, auto-investing apps, and food delivery are engineered specifically to eliminate decision-making moments — and companies openly market this friction-removal to retailers as a feature, not a side effect.
• 3.47% of managers cite lack of initiative as a serious problem with recent hires. Nearly 4 in 10 employers now actively prefer older workers over recent grads, because graduates have spent their entire lives in systems — rubrics, learning apps, dating apps — that pre-resolved every moment of ambiguity before they faced it.
• 4.Test score declines are diverging sharply by class, not falling evenly. OECD PISA math scores dropped 15 points between 2018–2022 — the largest ever recorded drop — but top performers held steady while bottom performers collapsed, because wealthier households can afford phone bans, private tutors, and screen-time policing that poorer households cannot.
• 5.86% of university students now use generative AI, with over half using it specifically to cheat. AI detection tools are too unreliable to use in disciplinary settings, meaning an entire cohort is passing through school without ever building the 'figuring things out' muscle — while AI simultaneously replaces the junior roles that used to teach that skill on the job.
• 6.The obvious fixes — harder curricula, phone bans, friction in financial products — will almost certainly never happen. The market structurally rewards frictionless products, any business adding friction loses to a competitor that doesn't, regulators are a generation behind the technology, and budget-strapped schools will always choose a free chatbot over a salaried teacher.