Study Questions Role Math, Science Play in Nation’s GDP

A study of more than three dozen countries, including the United States, challenges the popular belief that superior student achievement on international mathematics and science tests breeds national economic success.

In the study, which tracks economic-growth patterns from 1970 to 2000, researchers found that the link between national productivity and high test scores weakens and, in some years, disappears when the so-called “Asian Tigers”—Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea—are removed from researchers’ calculations.

“If, in fact, the widespread belief that academic achievement is linked to economic growth is driven by only a few cases, then economic growth has something to do with those countries and not with the fact that they score high in math and science,” said Francisco O. Ramirez, the Stanford University researcher...