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Good SAT Scores Lead To Higher Egg Donor Prices
alphadogg writes "Analysis from Georgia Institute of Technology of college newspaper egg donor ads showed that higher payments offered to egg donors correlated with higher SAT scores. 'Holding all else equal, an increase of 100 SAT points in the score of a typical incoming student increased the compensation offered to oocyte donors at that college or university by $2,350,' writes researcher Aaron D. Levine in a paper published in the March-April issue of the Hastings Center Report. Concerned about eggs being treated as commodities, and worried that big financial rewards could entice women to ignore the risks of the rigorous procedures required for harvesting, the American Society for Reproductive Medicine discourages compensation based on donors' personal characteristics. The society also discourages any payments over $10,000."
I don't think society has any legitimate interest at stake here that is not covered by allowing the free market to set prices for human eggs. It should be interesting to see what egg buyers will place real $ value on.
This is a surprise? Just take a look around any big name campus - there will usually be some kind of ads posted looking for egg donors. I'm a student at Columbia University and I've seen posters offering $18,000 for eggs from any Columbia student for years.
If they offer you $35,000 for all of your eggs, take the offer.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
I called them and asked about what their going rate was for a high-SAT scorer like me, and they offered me $12,000!
Things went badly when I asked if the eggs had to be organic, and what size they should be, and was styrofoam OK or did they prefer paper cartons. Oh, and when they found out I was a guy.
Sexist bastards.
"This post contains words, known to the State of California to cause thought. Wash brain thoroughly after reading."
This should lead to geeks lessening jocks' reproductive advantages.
Egg donation: yet another way that a high SAT score help you get through college.
Each woman has two ovaries with 300,000 eggs each. At $35,000 per egg, that's $21-billion per woman. You'd think more women would cash in on this.
I think that the worries expressed betray a double standard. How does it make sense to worry about high-SAT women "ignoring the health dangers" of forced ovulation, when you don't worry about low-SAT women ignoring the same dangers and getting a tenth of the money for the ordeal? To be clear: these people don't want women to stop donating eggs. They don't want high-SAT women donating eggs for a lot of money. But the risk in each donation is the same!
In any case, an egg donor will suddenly get a quick and large pile of money. I think the real question should be: How will the money be spent? If the donor gets $50,000 and uses it to help pay for three semesters of her Princeton tuition, I don't see a problem. If another donor, who is not in college, spends $5,000 on shoes and handbags, I don't see a great deal of good having been done.
I know someone who has donated an egg, and she was actually pretty sick for a part of the procedure. Smart women in Princeton, who have other options, will not want to undergo something like this unless you offer them more money. That just seems like a fact. But if the people who want the eggs have the money, and their satisfaction is increased by the knowledge that their donor is academically talented, and the donor herself will use the money to develop her talents further, it's a clear case of "everyone wins."
So why does the American Society for Reproductive Medicine need to shit on this optimal outcome? I think they should be encouraging it!
Back in college our daily newspaper had standing offers in the $15-50k range for eggs of a woman above a certain height, below a certain weight, and above a certain SAT score.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
DO NOT donate sperm, it can bite you in the ass later. There have been court cases where the mother who was artificially inseminated with donated sperm was later able to track down the man who donated the sperm, and successfully sue him for child support.
This is just another example of where the family court system is biased against men. Women automatically get custody of children, or more custody than the man, unless they are on crack or something and this can be proven. Alimony is a total insult; it's the notion that a woman has a legal right to get used to a particular lifestyle that her husband provided, and therefore her former husband has to pay her money after the divorce to make sure she doesn't have to get used to what her income alone can provide. If that was really fair, the woman would have to continue having sex with the man after the divorce, since that was the lifestyle he was used to when married, but fairness is not the goal here. Imagine a couple suing the female egg donor for child support after using her egg to produce a baby. It would be laughed out of court. But women have successfully sued men for child support for donating sperm.
Warning to men - it might look like easy money for something you do anyway (masturbating) but seriously, it's a bad idea.
It seems ironic that women of higher learning who might, as some suggest, fund their education from their ovaries, would need to go to a fertility clinic after their successful education and careers that kept them way from the maternity ward until their 30s or 40s.
Maybe you missed the part about holding everything else equal.
"all else equal, an increase of 100 SAT points in the score of a typical incoming student increased the compensation offered to oocyte donors at that college or university by $2,350"
So I would presume they would compare across the same schools and adjust accordingly.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
It depends. How long is your SAT? If it's over 10 inches then yes.
The numbers are substantially lower across the board, largely because harvesting eggs is an unpleasant business, while harvesting sperm is modestly recreational; but the same general principles apply.
People are generally looking for one of two things(or a combination) in a donor: A) Approximately like them. Unless you want to have the "No, we didn't adopt; but I shoot blanks/am a poison-womb" chat with everybody who sees your children, you usually want a donor or donors who are phenotypically similar to you. B)Superiority. If you get to chose, why not? This tendency is sometimes constrained by point A); but, when it comes right down to it, this sort of "soft" eugenics is hard to argue with, particularly against a parent who wants the best for their child. We know that all sorts of traits, physical and behavioral, are at least modestly heritable, so why not load the dice?
SATs over 750 each
Certified Mensa IQ
Concert pianist
Well endowed
High metablosim - hint, hint
Blonde, blue eyes
Starting bid: $youcantaffordit
I hate being bipolar; it's awesome!
You pay for quality, and this is just an example of that. You wouldn't pay $15 for a McD's burger, at least most people wouldn't, but a Red Robin (or similar high end) one could command that sort of price.
I know some people might think that's horrible, but the cold-hard truth is that some people are higher quality than others. We might be equal before the law, and have equal rights, but when people are given a choice in potential breeding partners, they will opt for as high as they can afford. In the social realm, that means relying on their own value as judged by whatever criteria (looks, smarts, social success as measured by wealth, social success as measured by "charm", etc) to get as good a "product" as possible. The pricing in this article just reflects the ability to turn one set of attributes into cash, and people's willingness to pay for certain attributes.
So we know that certain people have higher risks of developing certain diseases based on genetic factors, such as gender (color-blindness in men) or 'race' (Tay-Sachs in Ashkenazi jews). People are even willing to pay more for eggs or sperm from people with high SAT scores or PhD's. Yet, when a Harvard University President suggests that maybe certain aspects of intelligence are based on genetics, it causes an uproar.
I'm not suggesting that a certain race or sex is inferior to another, but why is the mere suggestion that intelligence is based on genetics (and therefore gives inherent benefits to certain genetic groups) considered so taboo? Can't we at least consider, discuss, and perform rigorous research on the subject?
I don't know about that. This link, The Resume of George W. Bush (the early years), from another follow-up post, would seem to indicate otherwise. I can't authenticate its accuracy, but have seen some of the items listed in other articles.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
It does take brains, but not necessarily his. I always suspected that pre-2006 Bush was little more than a pawn of Dick Cheney. It was only after the Republican Congressional defeat that he started to defy him (ousting Cheney's old buddy Rumsfeld, taking more moderate stances on Cheney's favorite issues, etc.).
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
For some weird reason, I'm irked by the standard disclaimer in the article that discourages egg donation for (implied) paying your way through college. Risky as any surgical procedure may be, it's a far cry from any Ayn-Rand-gone-amuk dystopian cliche.
(says one geek with laissez-faire ethics...)
Charisma is the measure of someone's ability to lie with a straight face.
Or you could actually adopt. That would be the sensible solution.