The Hire-a-Teacher scale of Ann Romney’s Horse

A big hullabaloo has been made about Mitt Romney’s $77,000 deduction claim on his dancing horse. The counterclaim that Romney only got $50 for the deduction is credible, but misses a larger point.

The Romneys have the means and are willing to spend $77,000 on 1/3 of a horse. To put that in perspective using my HaT scale, only 1/3 of Rafalca (the Ann Romney shares ownership with two other people. To be fair, I do not know if it’s an even split between the three) scores a 1.9. That is, the expenditures for one third of this dancing horse is almost enough to pay two teachers for one year. Assuming that the Romneys spent a proportionate share on Rafalca, this dancing horse scores almost a 5.8 HaTs.

Rafalca’s worth almost six teachers. That’s pretty steep for a horse, of course, of course!

But the Romneys, and those whom they represent, will fight tooth and nail any attempt to make them use a little bit more of their money to actually hire teachers.