The most accurate predictor of earning power is literacy. According to a number of international studies, it is a better indicator¹ than years of education.

Literacy does not just mean being able to read, but also refers to how well you cope with the written language. This is greatly affected² by the number of words you heard or read as a child, or have learned since. For this reason, immigrants often have low literacy levels in the language of their new country. Improving literacy is something you can work on at any time, on your own, without going to school or taking special programs.

Nearly all publications thus reduce the complexity³ of written communications, as measured by various readability indicators⁴. This is undoubtedly⁵ a sensible idea for communicating with and appealing to the majority of people. However, if you as an individual want to improve your word power, you should head in the opposite direction. Time Magazine and Newsweek are only written at a Grade 10 level and most popular novels are at a Grade 7 to 10 level. If everything you read is at a grade 10 level or less, your literacy level will stagnate⁶. Try to read more challenging material to increase your literacy fitness and earning power.

Give yourself a literacy workout, regularly. Soon, you will see a difference in the way you use words and in the way people react to your input⁷. Here's how:

Find articles on the Internet: Look for articles that are interesting but a little difficult or complex to digest. There is almost no limit to the variety of content available on the web, at all levels of difficulty. BNET and Gutenberg are just some examples of great sources of articles and e-books.

Push yourself beyond your comfort level. You may do most of your reading away from the computer, but the Internet is a great place to hone your skills. On the Internet you can identify the difficulty level of different types of reading, as I will explain. In addition you can access online dictionaries and other language resources which can help you.

Know the complexity of your reading material: Find out where your comfort level is. Copy a sample page from a source or article that interests you and paste it into Google Documents. There you can go to File/Word Count and you will see several readability indicators. I use the Automated⁸ Reader Index which indicates the number of years of schooling⁹ required to understand a text.

Now try to read content that is a level or two higher, whatever that level is. Keep challenging yourself with harder and harder material until you are comfortable with content that is at an index of 12 or 15 or higher. Once you have an idea of the complexity of different types of reading you can target this kind of content for your off line reading too.

Measure the richness of the vocabulary: While you have selected text still on your clipboard, go to Tom Cobb's Vocabulary Profiler. There you can see how many words are within the first 1000 most frequent words, how many are "academic" (AWL¹⁰), and how many are Off-List words. Try to get to the point where you are comfortable reading material that has around 10% or more words in both the AWL and the Off-List categories. Don't hesitate to use online dictionaries and other word learning systems for increasing your vocabulary, if you need to.

Listen and read: If you want to train your brain to become comfortable with complex language content, seek out sites which offer audio with transcripts¹¹ for free download. Voice of America, and Interesting Things of the Day are but two examples of such sites. To improve your ability to read complex content, listen to the same content as you are reading. This is an effective way to learn languages, and works wonderfully for improving your reading skills, whatever your level.

Writing that seemed unnecessarily complicated or confusing will gradually seem clear. If you are up to it, try something like James Joyce's Ulysses. I could never read Proust, but I now enjoy him through audio books.

Try an example. Listen to and read this article on Biometrics. It has the following profile:

Readability Index: 15 years of education

First 1000 frequency words: 70 %

Academic Word List words: 8 %

Off-List words: 13 %

You can train yourself to get used to language that at first seems difficult to understand. As your language skills improve, you will find that your writing and oral expression will also improve. You will not need to take those remedial writing, or "higher level thinking" courses which are offered in college to students with poor literacy skills. And your earning potential will increase, for life.

根据世界上大量研究显示，获得收益的最准确的预言家是具有读写能力的人，具有这种能力胜过接受几年的教育。

有文化并不意味着你只会阅读，而是指你运用书面语言的能力有多强。你在孩童时，听到或读到的词汇量的多少或那时学到的东西的多少对以后语言运用的能力影响很大。因为这方面原因，移民对其所移居国家的语言的读写能力一般都很低。你可以靠自学随时随地提高读写能力，不必非要去学校或者参加专业课程学习。

几乎所有的出版物都将复杂的内容简化了，就像被各种各样的易读指示器标准化了似的。这无疑对沟通和吸引更多的读者是一个明智的想法。但是,作为个人想要提高词汇能力，则必须反其道而行之。时间杂志与新闻周刊写作水平只有十级，而大多数通俗小说只有7~10级水平。如果你读的东西都在10级及其以下水平，你的读写能力就会停滞不前。努力读一些较难的东西来提高你的读写能力及获得收效。

定期为自己做一个读写能力方面的测验。很快，你就会看到自己使用词汇的差距和人们对你这方面反应的差别。下面是一些方法：

在网上找文章：找一些有趣但有一点难度和复杂的文章。在网上几乎可以找到各种各样难度较高的文章。BNET和Gutenberg有许多这方面的资源和电子书籍。

尽量不读易懂水平的东西。你可以不在电脑上阅读，但是网络是训练你技能的好地方。在网上你可以分辨出不同阅读类型的级别，正如我所要解释的。另外，你可以借助在线词典和其他语言资源来阅读。

了解你所阅读材料的复杂程度：找出你最适宜阅读的级别是多少。从你感兴趣的一篇材料或文章中复制一篇样本页，把它粘贴进Google Documents.在这里你可以点击文件/词汇，可以看到几种可读指示器。我使用Automated Reader Index ， 它可以指示出数字，代表学校要求理解的一篇课文属于几年级的水平。

现在试着读比原来高一级或高二级的内容，无论几级水平，都要坚持不懈读越来越难的材料，直到你能轻而易举读懂指数为12或15或更高级的内容。一旦你对不同种类阅读内容的复杂程度有所了解，你可以同样以此为标准来阅读不在网上的内容。

测量词汇量多少：当你已经选择了的课文仍在线，那么你可以连接Tom Cobb's Vocabulary Profiler。你可以看到你选择的文章有多少词汇属于列表中前1000个最常用的单词，有多少词汇属于专业词汇（AWL），有多少词汇不在列表。尽力找出这样的材料，适合你读，而且材料中有大约10%或更多的词汇在AWL或列表之外的范围。如果需要，请使用在线词典和其他单词学习工具来丰富你的词汇。

注重听和读：如果你想训练你的大脑对复杂语言有良好的反应，那么寻找能提供免费下载音频材料的网站。Voice of America和 Interesting Things of the Day就是这样的网站。为了提高你阅读复杂内容的能力，可边阅读边听。无论你处于什么水平，这种方法都是你提高阅读能力最有效的方法。

写下看起来复杂的或令人迷惑的内容，理解就会逐渐变得清晰起来。如果你的起点高，那么读像James Joyce's Ulysses的内容。我从来没读过Proust,但是我通过听音频书籍，我现在很喜欢他的作品。

举一个例子。听读this article on Biometrics.概况如下：

阅读指数：教育15年级。

前1000个常用单词：70%

专业词汇：8%

列表之外的词：13%

你可训练自己熟悉那些刚开始看起来难理解的语言。当你的语言技能提高了，你会发现你的写作和表达能力也随之提高了。你不需要参加那些训练写作的补习班，或者参加为读写能力差的在校大学生提供的“高水平思考课程”。同样你的读写能力会不断提高。