When you take away all the gains and nonrecurring items, their return on equity has exceeded 10 percent only twice in the last decade.
The returns in new jobs and new technologies have traditionally far exceeded the money invested on the front end by the federal government.
If the return on equity did not exceed 7 percent, many employees stood to make only a third of what they made in previous years.
This requires that the expected return from the short position exceeds the riskless rate.
There's nothing wrong with big Government as long as the social returns exceed the cost.
The real return to common stocks over the last 70 years has exceeded 7 percent, while Treasury bonds have averaged less than 2 percent.
This implies that the social return on such projects exceeds the private return to those making the decisions.
Many governments believe that the social return on R & d exceeds its private return.
"Unless the company's return on capital exceeds its cost of capital, management is destroying shareholder wealth."
A 2010 study indicates that the "return on investment" for graduating from the top 1000 colleges exceeds 4% over a high school degree.