What would top soccer players be worth in Adam Smith’s barter economy?

Lukaku: The Welsh postal service

Lukaku was Everton last season. He scored 42 percent of his team’s league goals. Now he’s gone. We won’t know what Everton will look like without him, but losing Lukaku is a bit like losing an appendage. Can people that have lost arms or legs succeed? Absolutely. Some of them have even become champion athletes. But it’s a lot harder and expends more energy. Everton has a far harder road without their man up front.

If Everton had to do it over again, they should have asked for more than a paltry £72 million. The Toffees should have demanded no less than the Welsh postal system.

The Welsh part of the Royal Mail is pretty amazing. Some houses in Wales don’t even have addresses. The postmen have to memorize where people live and make sure they get their letters. It’s an astonishing amount of labor. That workforce would almost make up for losing Belgium’s best striker.

Why just the Welsh part? Well, all told, the Royal Mail brings in almost £10 billion a year. Lukaku is tremendously valuable, but let’s not get ahead ourselves. He’s not bringing in that kind of money even if he scores 100 percent of United’s goals this year.

This would obviously cause some issues. First of all, the Royal Mail would have to spin off the Welsh portion of its business. It’s a publicly traded company, so that part wouldn’t be too difficult. Secondly, United would have to somehow gain possession of the newly-minted Welsh Royal Mail, and then flip that to Everton in exchange for Lukaku.

Finally, Everton would have to figure out what to do with it. Sure, Liverpool is near Wales, but it’s not exactly in it. They wouldn’t see direct benefits from possessing a parcel delivery service in another country.

Then again, they figured out what to do with Rooney, so we know they’re good at this kind of thing.