O' Yee Of Good Faith

Greetings,

Economics, on a smaller scale.

The President of the United States notices that his brick wall has broken down next to the White House. Being the proactive POTUS (thats Secret Service talk right there) that he is, he calls in 3 contractors. One from Russia, one from China and another from India.

All 3 contractors look at the wall, and the Russian contractor gets out some measuring tape, takes some figures in his notepad, makes a few calls to his suppliers for material costs and says to the Prez, "For you, USD$1000!". So the Prez replies "How did you come to that price?"

The Russian says "Simple. USD$700 for material. USD$100 for labour and USD$200 for me."

The Prez nods, and mentions for the Chinese contractor to give it a go. The Chinese contractor pulls out a tape measure, takes some notes, and right away has an estimate, "USD$700. USD$500 for material, USD$50 for labour, and rest, for me."

Impressed, the Prez now looks at the Indian contractor, and motions for a quote. The Indian contractor looks at the wall, and then at the other 2 contractors and says, "USD$2700."

Shocked at such a high sum, the Prez says "Wow, how did you come up with that? You didn't even measure or check with your suppliers? It's way over the other 2 guy's quotes!"

The Indian contractor beckons the Prez over and whisper's "Simple. USD$1000 for me. USD$1000 for you, and we hire the Chinese guy to do it for us."


[Note: Found it in an email]

Dav out