Those are operating costs, I’m referring to control of the board of directors.

Market cap is around $141 billion.

Number of employees is around 60,000.

60% of employees: 36,000.

60% of market cap: $84 billion.

$84B / 36,000 = $2.33 million.

I did some ‘back of the napkin’ math a few days ago to see what it would take for the employees in my company to purchase enough shares for a controlling stake in the company. I figured that we’d never get 100% of the employees to buy in, but we also don’t need 100% of the shares, so to keep it easy I calculated if 60% bought 60% of the shares… and it would cost each employee around $2.3 million.

That tells me that each employee provides $2.3 million worth of value to the company… and we’re not getting paid anywhere near that. Not even close.