Brilliant

I have a fondness for news stories that reveal the silly foolishness of politicians. Here’s a great example from the Detroit Free Press this morning:

Heritage Park's athletic fields are expected to receive new energy-efficient lights by mid-March, in a change that is projected to save $121,500 in energy costs over the next 25 years.

The $272,950 project, funded by federal stimulus dollars and timed to avoid disrupting the next playing season, involves removing lights that were installed more than 25 years ago on the two softball fields and replacing them with 60 luminaries mounted on 10 new athletic field poles.

Let me sum this up:

$272,950 will be spent to save $121,500 over the next twenty-five years. By my math (and help me out if I am adding this wrongly), in fifty years, the estimated cost savings will be $243,000.

Which means that in fifty years these lights still be just a shade under $30,000 of paying for themselves. 

And my guess is that the lights (and possibly the fields) will be long gone by then.

Instead of hyping the nonsensical cost savings (which aren’t cost savings at all) why don’t we just say, “The federal government is passing out free money like candy and we might as well get some for us.”