I don't think AGI is right around the corner

The stat is skewed wildly by immigration. The literacy level of native born Americans is higher. The population of foreign born adults is nearly 20% of the total adult population, and as you can imagine many are actively learning English.

It’s not skewed much by immigration. This is because the native-born population is much larger.

See: https://www.migrationpolicy.org/sites/default/files/publicat...

51% of native-born adults scored at Level 3 or higher. This is considered the benchmark for being able to manage complex tasks and fully participate in a knowledge-based society. Only 28% of immigrant adults achieved this level. So yes immigrants are in trouble, but it’s still a huge problem with 49% native-born below Level 3.

The immigration is actually working to boost literacy levels. Americans have been falling off for a long time.

In my mind “literate” is not “hand complex tasks”, it’s a basic ability to read and write.

Seems like the standards have changed over time?

Considering the amount of digitalization in society, more government regulations, etc. I think basic literacy alone does not guarantee you can participate in society effectively.

But in the past, literacy was typically defined as "bare minimum".

It's fine if we want to change it to "sufficiently master language to do a white collar job", but if the standard changes we shouldn't be surprised fewer people meet it.