Google's Economic Value $119 Billion?

Here's how an economist would conduct the analysis. Google economist Hal Varian came to the conclusion that Google saves us 3.75 minutes per day, and then used the average U.S. hourly earnings numbers ($22) to calculate that Google saves users $1.37 a day. That number multiplied by 365 days in a year equals $500. Varian then multiplied that $500 number by 130 million, the number of people employed in the US, to get to $65 billion value in savings for users.

Adding those two bottom line numbers $65 billion + $54 billion together results in the rough ballpark of the total value of Google to US users ($119 billion), Varian holds. For comparison Google’s global market cap is $187.04 billion.

But that $119 billion number doesn’t take into account extraneous factors like the value to non-employed. “You should think about these numbers as an underestimate," says Varian. The value of getting answers to questions immediately is a pretty big deal.”