DAILY DIRT: Ohtani’s new contract would break down to $7,990.87 per hour

I think Shohei Ohtani has knocked Taylor Swift from the top of the most-talked about list … Welcome to today’s three thoughts that make up Vol. 808 of The Daily Dirt.

1. Several popular baseball sites have carried the following breakdown of Shohei Ohtani’s new 10-year, $700 million contract.

Let’s just say Shohei won’t have to worry about making a mortgage payment or the price of gas.

Here’s how that contract breaks down on a 12-month scale. I’m trusting all the math is correct:

Per year: $70,000,000

Per month: $5,833,333.33

Per week: $1,346,153.84

Per day: $191,780.32

Per hour: $7,990.87

Per minute: $133.18.

Per second: $2.22

Per game: $432,098.77

Those figures do not figure in any of the deferred payments, which will be $680 million as he is getting $2 million a year for the first 10 years.

2. Signs of the times:

• “Making a boat out of a stone would be a hardship.”
• “If cars have to be roadworthy, shouldn’t roads have to be carworthy.” (Someone must have been driving lately in Quincy.)
• “My wife thought our kids were spoiled, but I think most kids smell like that.”
• “Inspecting mirrors is a job I could really see myself doing.”
• “Seasickness comes in waves.”

3. Here’s some good new for consumers.

CNN is reporting Dollar General is joining the growing list of retail chains reversing course on self-checkout technology.

“We had started to rely too much this year on self-checkout in our stores,” Dollar General CEO Todd Vasos said late last week. “We should be using self-checkout as a secondary checkout vehicle, not a primary.”

CNN noted Dollar General had aggressively expanded self-checkout stations, adding them to more than half of its approximately 19,000 stores. The company also piloted stores with only self-checkout options and no cashier lanes. Like other retailers, Dollar General bet self-checkout would reduce its labor costs and speed up checkout for customers. 

The company is revising its self-checkout strategy to improve sales and cut down on merchandise losses, known as “shrink.” Shrink includes shoplifting, employee theft, damaged products, administrative errors, online fraud and other factors.

“It helps on the sales line because we’ve got somebody to meet, greet and ring up the customer,” Vasos said. “It also helps on the shrink line because (we’ve) got somebody at the front end of the store that is always there to monitor” the area.

Retailers’ self-checkout strategies have also contributed to their shrink woes. Retailers lose more possible sales with self-checkout than full-service cashiers, both from intentional shoplifting and honest errors by customers.

Companies with self-checkout lanes had a loss rate more than double the industry average.

Steve Thought O’ The Day — I have never checked myself out, nor do I plan to start anytime soon.

Steve Eighinger writes daily for Muddy River News. He’ll wreck himself before he’ll check himself.