It ’s common knowledge that Death Stars arewildly expensive weapons of mass destruction . What we did n’t have it away — until now — is that destroying two of them would bankrupt the Galactic Empire . ostensibly Luke and his small banding of Rebels did n’t scranch the numbers , either .
Like it or not , that ’s the sobering conclusion of a new analysis of the economic radioactive dust of the Death Stars ’ destruction performed by fiscal engineering professor Zachary Feinstein . Feinstein ’s paper , aptly style “ It ’s a Trap : Emperor Palpatine ’s Poison Pill , ” can be scan in its entirety on arXiv . Here ’s the long and short of it .
Although others have worked out thecost of build a Death Star before , Feinstein decided to start from excoriation , approximate the amount of steel and other sore materials require to build the planet - destroy weapon . After factoring in research and development , he arrived at a entire cost of $ 419 quintillion dollars for both Galactic warfare machine .
That material body may sound mind - boggling , but we should remember that Emperor Palpatine had an intact Galactic Empire ’s worth of asset at his disposal . Feinstein , for his part , was more interested in learning how the Imperial banking organisation would respond if the largest construction project in the Galaxy was all of a sudden destroy . Popular Science excuse his determination :
Since these Sir Joseph Banks are in all probability heavily invested in the Empire itself and the Death Star specifically , the end of one Death Star byintergalactic terroristsand the collapse of the Empire following the destruction of the minute , would lay waste to the galactic grocery , and make a financial crisis on a truly massive scale .
Without pregnant cash on hand to bail out the crumble financial organization — and from the size of it and shape of Ackbar ’s fleet I consider it ’s safe to assume the Rebels were operating on a shoe lace — Feinstein close that the Alliance ’s assault on Sith authority would have precipitate an economic disaster of “ galactic proportions . ”
We can only take the ever - scheming Palpatine is smile from beyond the grave .
[ Read thefull paperat arXiv h / tPopular Science ]
Top image : Lucasfilm
Star Wars
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