My claim is that the average nerd creates far more positive externalities through his/her work then the average American does. I do not have rigorous statistics to back this up, but I believe it is probably true because nerds have high IQ and conscientiousness and this is strongly correlated with income (and so taxes paid) and nerds tend to work in STEM fields and these, I believe, have more positive externalties than most fields do, and nerds dominate the software industry and this industry plays a big part in U.S. economic growth and military power. Also, if (like me) you believe that the future of mankind will come down to whether we get friendly AI right, then our species' fate is in the hands of a few ultra-nerds.