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Notes -
I presume they weren’t referring to “2x + y = 10, y = 4, what’s x?”.
While I use the content of HS algebra daily, I remember nothing about how it was taught in high school, lol. That said, looking up 'algebra 2 exam pdf' on google, and I think an average IQ person could, with high-quality instruction, get a B or A. Things like the quadratic formula, factoring, reduced form, solving equations equations with polynomials, multiple variables, and ratios, drawing graphs, word problems, etc. My memory of tutoring is the slower students (still not below-average iq I think) were able to grasp that eventually, but maybe there was still some selection bias. This is the sort of thing one's default intuition might be bad for.
Looking for data on algebra knowledge for current students, the closest measurement I can find is that "Only 26% of 12th grade students scored at or above the proficient level on the NAEP math assessment". 38% were basic, the remaining were below basic. But apparently NAEP proficiency measures a significantly higher level of skill than grade-level, algebra is grade 8-11. Some of this is just guessing passwords I suppose. But when tutoring, students who were blatantly guessing passwords on specific kinds of problems, even things as basic as 'x + 1 = 2 ... durr .. x = = 3 ????' were perfectly capable of learning the real thing if you taught them well, so I think that with good tutoring most median IQ people could grasp most of algebra. I'm not entirely confident in that though, and I can't find any very strong evidence on this.
I'm not sure about calculus, and anything above that is probably beyond the limits of most, although I'm uncertain where the lines are.
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