What is the average degree of cousin relationship between two random people?

Question

Assuming two people of mixed ethnicity have long family histories in North America, and share ethnic groups that are common in the population generally, how closely would they be related by random chance? If I found out a famous person is my ninth cousin, should I care?

Answer 1

Who knows what the random chance would be, and no, you shouldn't care.

Answer 2

If any two persons HAPPEN to have ancestry from a particular place, in early America.. they often will stumble into some kind of connection.  Early America was very sparsely populated, and without easy transportation, they TENDED to marry someone local.  

There is no way to predict any AVERAGE or lack of average.. since not everyone has traced their lineage.  There is nothing random chance about genealogy.. you trace your ancestry, and it is, whatever it happens to be.  It just don't work like that.

If you happen to be related to someone famous.. hey, its up to you, what you want to think of it.  Genealogists find it fun. Others can't be bothered.  You might be able to quote the batting average for every player on a baseball team for the last 50 yrs.  I would find that totally useless and boring.  I'm not right or wrong for that.. there is no more "should" in what you like, than there are "average cousin relationships".