FORT KNOX GOLD AUDIT

Welcome To The 300 Club HUB On AGORACOM

We may not make much money, but we sure have a lot of fun!

Reply New Message

Prev Message Back To Forum Threaded View Next Message

abstacey

Rank: President [?]

Points: 21746 [?]

Votes: 122 Score: 3.4 [?]

Your Vote:

Please Log In to Vote

Did you know? You can earn activity points by filling your profile with information about yourself (what city you live in, your favorite team, blogs etc.)

FORT KNOX GOLD AUDIT

posted on Jun 27, 2011 07:09PM

An article yesterday titled '700,000 gold bars held in Fort Knox. The report says that would cost U.S. taxpayers about U.S.$15.0 million. I added the following comment to the article:

If there really are only 700,000 gold bars in Fort Knox there has to be something seriously wrong with the idea it would take 400 people 6 months to count it. Unless American arithmetic works differently than Canadian arithmetic 700,000 divided by 400 is 1,750. I am 69 years old. I would have thought it would be an easy task to count 500 gold bars per day, and simultaneously account for the serial numbers on each. Assuming 5 working days per week, working at a rate of counting and recording 500 bars per day, it would take one person (700,000 / 500 / 5) 280 weeks to count the gold said to be in Fort Knox. That equates to 70 properly supervised people working for 4 weeks to count 700,000 gold bars. What am I missing?

Even if I am wrong by more than 50%, and it would be possible only to count and record gold bar serial numbers at a rate of 30 per hour, assuming a 7 hour working day it would take 700,000/(7X30) = 3,333 working days, or 70 properly supervised people 3,333/70 = 48 (rounded) days, or 12 weeks, to count the gold bars said to be in Fort Knox. At that count rate, if 400 people working for 6 months would cost U.S.$15.0 million (an annual imputed income rate of U.S.$75,000 per person), 70 people working for 3 months would cost slightly over U.S.$1.3 million which is a long ways from the $15 million projected.. It seems to me:

· even at my assumed lower counting rate, U.S.$1.3 million plus supervisory costs would be a small price to pay to satisfy the American public and the world that Fort Knox indeed has the physical gold claimed; and,

· if the cost estimates quoted were generated by U.S. civil servants, and the implication in the video is that they were: (1) this is a blatant example of the view of at least one or two U.S. government civil servants as to 'productivity expectations' of government employees, (2) and if representative of general 'U.S. civil servant productivity expectations' there may well be a lot more U.S. civil servants 'on the dole' as productivity demands on remaining civil servants is increased as U.S. Federal, State and Local Governments work to cut their respective deficits.