I actually wanted to post this to clarify how points about it ought to be made, it’s pretty old and people know about it. Education resources in the USA are really unfairly distributed. It’s not that Americans are so evil because they’re stupid, it’s part of their de facto apartheid state’s continuation. Americans support bloodthirsty imperialism in order to hoard the education funding via property taxes in little enclaves. You’re not going to educate them out of killing you. They don’t care if you watch One Piece, and many don’t recognize this deal won’t be doled out to new generations on the same level, and will always get worse.
Of course, the educated and wealthy Americans are unusually stupid, globally, but I don’t think anyone is doubting that right now.
I’d want a supplemental study on the reading level of ESL folk in their first language. Furthermore the gauge of literacy isn’t simply knowing how to pronounce words or the alphabet or whatever, it’s a measure of broader skills like the ability to retain and parse information. Reading a graph is also part of general literacy. Someone who could read every word of the first page of a book out loud, but then they’re unable to summarize it, or unable to answer questions or make a response would be someone functionally illiterate.
Someone who’s ESL and has a hard time parsing English, but still able to retain information they read in English, is far more literate than a native English speaking American who reads like a 10 year old child.