Do the Math

Math and Econmics, not my best subjects

100,000. Now that's a nice ROUND number. You could even say it is nice and round and PLUMP. Just like the horses that go to slaughter! Of course! It's NOT the old and infirmed horses that go to slaughter, if you think about it.Would a farmer take his skinny old dying cow to the State Fair to try to win a prize for its meat?NO! The USDA reports that 92% of horses going to slaughter are YOUNG and SOUND.BUT, we still love that nice round plump number of 100,000.. So let's go with that.IF you do the math, and IF you believe there are that many "unwanted" horses, here is the problem you have to solve:100,000/3077 counties in the United States=32.5/12 months=2.7 horses per county per month!Does THAT sound like horses wandering the streets? 2.7 horses a month?Are you aware that tens of thousands of horses that are stolen every year go to slaughter? ZERO investment, 100 % profit! I'm in the wrong line of work! Why didn't I pay attention in Economics class?Are you aware that tens of thousands of horses go to slaughter as a by-product of the PMU industry? Yup, Premarin, that drug that causes cancer in women comes from the urine of pregnant mares. Now that's a visual I could do without!NOW, let's re-work the problem. I know 50,000 isn't quite as round and plump as 100,000. In fact, it would probably be left on the feedlot to die. But it is a much more realistic number.I think all we have to do is divide the 2.7 by 2, am I right? (Please check my math!) I got 1.35 horses per county per month. Don't you round DOWN? if it is less than 5? Help me here!What I ended up with is APPROXIMATELY ONE HORSE PER COUNTY PER MONTH!Are your calculators smoking?O.K. Back to economics. I read somewhere that 1% of any industry can be absorbed by the industry itself, this industry being the HORSE industry.From the article:"About 1 percent of the estimated 9.2 million horses in America go to (meat) market each year," Doesn't that say ONE PERCENT? "The number of unwanted horses is so large, we don't feel there are enough rescue and retirement programs to absorb them all."I should have paid better attention in ECON 101.
Barb AZ, Glendale, AZ