How Much Would You Pay?

Governor Blagojevich stands accused of attempting to sell President-Elect Obama's vacant seat in the U.S. Senate. Among other things, he asked for a very plum position at a non-profit or union job. His wife was part of any prospective deal.

Obviously a U.S. Senate seat has its value to each person and, in the case of Blagojevich, his spouse. Andrew Roth takes a crack at calculating the value of this open seat and comes out with a NPV (Net Present Value) of $6.2 million. However, this number is underestimates the what can be termed as the going price, considering in the 2004 election candidates for Illinois senate seat collectively spent $17.25 million.

There's another problem with this estimate. In accounting for only possible benefits, Mr. Roth makes a mistake similar to those made by environmentalists touting the economic returns of green power such as the number of jobs. If jobs were a benefit employees would pay their employers for them. For me the costs of a political career (including the deal-making with high-maintenance peers on a daily basis) would signal that the costs are much higher than the benefits.

This might be one of the many reasons that I was not asked to place a bid on the senate seat.