Numbers in the News
Prison Costs, DOGE Savings -- It's Truly Staggering
The news is full of staggering numbers these days.
In Arkansas, our Republican Governor is looking to build a state prison that will cost anywhere from $825 million to $1.2 billion just for construction, not counting $70 million/year in operating costs.
DOGE estimates it has saved taxpayers $140 billion so far via "fraud detection/deletion, contract/lease cancellations, contract/lease renegotiations, asset sales, grant cancellations, workforce reductions, programmatic changes, and regulatory savings."
Are your eyes rolling up in your head yet? Just what do these big (some might say YUGE) numbers really mean to the average, regular, everyday taxpayer?
Here’s some examples to think about:
$10,000 - $100,000
The largest denomination of paper currency (U.S.) now in circulation is the $100 bill. Banks gather bills into stacks with various colored "currency straps" that indicate which paper currency bills are in the stack. A mustard colored strap means $100 bills; with 100 bills in the stack, each stack is worth $10,000. If you have 10 of these stacks, you're looking at $100,000.
$1 Million
So, what's a million look like? Well, that's 100 of those mustard-banded stacks and it fits into a secure briefcase:
Prison Cost
Now … imagine 825 of those briefcases -- that's the low-ball construction cost of this prison Governor Sanders wants to build in Franklin County. Go ahead and add in 375 more briefcases and we get a better picture of a more realistic number of $1.2 billion:
DOGE Savings
Next, let’s look at DOGE's $140 billion. If 1000 of those briefcases is equal to $1 billion, then DOGE has saved us 140,000 briefcases full of taxpayer dollars so far.
And … DOGE’s goal of $2 trillion in savings looks something like this:
THIS REPRESENTS OUR TAXPAYER DOLLARS.
The numbers in the news are truly staggering!