Are You Smarter Than A Politician?

The Intercollegiate Studies Institute reminds us of something to keep in mind when elected officials are involved:

Of the 2,508 People surveyed, 164 say they have held an elected government office at least once in their life. Their average score on the civic literacy test is 44%, compared to 49% for those who have not held an elected office. Officeholders are less likely than other respondents to correctly answer 29 of the 33 test questions.

In the interest of full disclosure, I took the test and got 33 of 33 questions correct, though I have been having a rather good day. The political distribution of the office holders in the sample closely matches the distribution in the population, so the result appears to be a measure of bipartisan and nonpartisan ignorance.