Nazi Math
German math textbooks that were used during the reign of Adolf Hitler in the Second World War, whose word problems often mockingly or sickeningly demonize the “undesirables.”
One 1941 Nazi math question is: “Every day, the state spends RM 6 on one cripple; RM 4 1/2on one mentally ill person; RM 5 1/2 on one deaf and dumb person; RM 5 3/5 on one feeble-minded person; RM 3 on one alcoholic; RM 4 4/5 on one pupil in care; RM 2 1/10 on one pupil at a special school; and RM 9/20 for one pupil at a normal school. Calculate the expenditure of the state for one pupil in a special school and one pupil in an ordinary school over eight years and state the amount of higher cost engendered by the special school pupil.”