An addition mistake in a recent article from the Idaho Freedom Foundation

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We need to carefully edit what we write, even just a table with a sum of six numbers. There is an article by Fred Birnbaum at the Idaho Freedom Foundation on April 30, 2026 titled Saving money should not be a thankless task for legislators. Fred’s LinkedIn page says has an MBA, so dealing with numbers should not be a thankless task for him. 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That article contains the table shown above, which I have annotated. The line for Total saved before Governor Veto is listed as $107,576,800 – but is $800 too large; it should be $107,576,000. You can easily spot that the hundreds digit is wrong, since there are two 2s and a 6 which should total to 10 rather than 8. And similarly, the Total saved after Governor Veto is listed as $107,098,200 – but it also should be $800 smaller at $107,097,400.  

 

The adding machine image came from Wikimedia Commons.