Wednesday, January 14, 2015

How Much Am I Worth?


The other day, my friend and off-and-on fellow blogger Buggie linked to this interesting website from her Facebook page - How Much Am I Worth: Human For Sale Calculator. It allows you to calculate your asking price based on three short screens of questions like the obvious (age, sex, weight, hair color), and moving on to general health, physical fitness, and sense of humor, and an array of other factors (management skills, artistic ability, "sense of style," etc).

I took the survey, answering the questions as honestly as I could*, and calculated my value as $3,105,531 … roughly $240,000 short of what Buggie calculated as her value**.

This 2011 article from DataGenetics takes a bit different approach to calculating the value of an average human body, using as its basis the resale value of the chemical elements of which the body is composed … a meager $160***. The article also references a survey conducted by Wired magazine+ that provided yet another calculation of the value of an average human body, based on its value for constituent parts like bone marrow, blood, DNA, and individual organs … calculated on that basis, the estimated value (at that time) was in the neighborhood of $45,000,000.

So much for that old saw about the whole being more than the sum of its parts, eh?

How much are you worth? Leave a comment ... inquiring minds want to know.


Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

* Okay, I gave myself the benefit of the doubt on the one that asks for an assessment of "attractiveness," and I didn't know what my IQ was, so I guessed.

** Not surprising, perhaps, as she’s considerably younger, cuter, and more vivacious, while I’m teetering on the brink of senile decrepitude.

*** Of course, this was in 2011, so it’s probably gone up a bit since then.

+ This link doesn't take you to the referenced survey, which I was unable to locate, but to a related article that's interesting on its own.

7 comments:

eViL pOp TaRt said...

A very interesting and fun questionnaire. I don't know my IQ also, and I made stabs at estimating athleticism, attractiveness, and some of the others. Sense of style? Depends. Anyway, my number is $3.307,880. I hope the taxman doesn't get wind of that

Duckbutt said...

$3,227,262

Linda Kay said...

$3,128 - must have been that IQ question that everyone missed. I have no idea, nor do I know how to find out.

Margaret (Peggy or Peg too) said...

Well I guess I'm not as valuable as you Bill. :-)
$3,015,628
Gosh I'm not worth much apparently compared to you all.

Bilbo said...

Don't feel bad, Peggy - I'm hoping that Linda Kay had a keyboard malfunction ...

Mike said...

$3,132,371

allenwoodhaven said...

$3,276,630. I happen to know my IQ score; another student gave me the test for practice in grad school. I guessed at several questions, like style and attractiveness, so my number may be inflated. I'd take the money but someone would have to buy me and then I'd have no place to exist!