Math Destruction

So 10 o'clock rolls around, and after some brief preparatory scribbling, I submit to being interviewed by Perky Pet Analyst. She explains the whole process to me, lays out proof she really has solved the world peace problem before, then settles into serious mode.

"So if you could do anything to improve the way things work around here, what would you do?" she inquires.

"Fire half of us," I offer happily.

The subject of mathematics occupies my thoughts a lot recently. The illustrative simplicity of numbers surpasses any amount of words. If the project were a textbook problem, it would read as follows:

Q1: It has taken 2 years for a group of 50 people to learn and program what 4 people do in 3 hours every month. If each of those 50 people are budgeted at $100 per hour (assuming a 40 hour work week), for how much money have the project sponsors been screwed?

A1: The project sponsors have been diddled out of $20,800,000.

Q2: Assuming the same billing rate for the group of 4, how many years will it take for the project to break even?

A2: Those 4 people would have to be doing the same thing for 1,444.444 years before the project becomes economically beneficial.

Whoever said math isn't fun?