Cost of compliance.... (rule of thumb)

From a recent Information Age report

"An emerging rule of thumb is that for every $1 billion in revenue, an
average of $500,000 is spent on compliance"

You now understand why the Chairman of the PCAOB* (Public Company
Accounbting Oversight Board) recently said..

"We have made is very clear to the audit firms that [Section] 404 [of
Sarbox] is not the way that they can afford to send all of their
grandchildren to Harvard"

* The PCAOB is a private-sector, non-profit corporation, created by
the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, to oversee the auditors of public
companies in order to protect the interests of investors and further
the public interest in the preparation of informative, fair, and
independent audit reports.