Lefties have got it right

Left-handed men who attended at least a year in college go on to earn significantly more than their right-handed classmates.

“Among the college-educated men in our sample, those who report being left-handed earn 13 per cent more than those who report being right-handed,'' said economist Christopher S Ruebeck of Lafayette College. Ruebeck and his research partners reported the findings in a new working paper published by the US National Bureau of Economic Research.

And lefties, stay in school. Those who finished all four years of college earned, on average, 21 per cent more than similarly educated right-handed men. Curiously, the researchers found no wage differential among left- and right-handed women.

These conclusions are based on an analysis of data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, a survey of approximately 5,000 men and women first interviewed in 1979, when they were 14 to 21 years old and then again in 1993 when they were 28 to 35.

Left-handers made up 10 per cent of their sample and the population as a whole. While evidence of a wage gap was unequivocal, explanations for the disparity proved more elusive. Differences in biology and brain function are two possibilities. Nor do the researchers know why they didn't see a similar effect among women.

The study is the latest to suggest there's something special about lefties. Other researchers have found that left-handers are overrepresented on university faculties, as well as among gifted students, artists and musicians.

Los Angeles Times-Washington Post