Angry birds are attacking the US economy

The Atlantic has a short article on estimating the cost to the US economy of the popular angry birds game available on most smartphones.  Their estimate?  $1.5 billion dollars a year.

"Every March, it is a requirement that every newspaper and website in every town in the United States run a story about how much money American companies lose because people watch the NCAA basketball tournament instead of working. Challenger, Gray, and Christmas, the consulting firm that makes such estimates, has tried their hand at other games recently, too. A couple years ago, they gave a number for fantasy football, saying the hobby costs companies $10.5 billion in lost wages. So, when I heard today that people play 200 million minutes of Angry Birds a day, I wanted to know if the company had ever looked into lost productivity resulting from those dastardly pigs and their winged assassins. Sadly and inexplicably, they haven't. So, after looking at their methodology, I came up with my own estimate. Here it is."

You can read the full article here.