Biden: 'I did the math'

By Robert Farley
Published on Friday, March 6th, 2009 at 5:27 p.m.

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"The average CEO makes $10,000 more every day ... than what the average worker makes every year."

Joe Biden, Thursday, March 5th, 2009.

Ruling: Half-True | Details

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Biden says he checked the numbers before he made his claim about CEO pay.

Vice President Joe Biden gave a shout-out to the common man at the annual conference of the AFL-CIO Executive Council on March 5.

"I want to point out that economic injustice and inequity are bad for everyone," Biden said. "It's just not right, it's just not right, and everybody knows it — it's just not right when the average CEO makes $10,000 more every day — $10,000 more every day than what the average worker makes every year — $10,000 per day. And by the way, before I said it, I did the math, I did the math, and it's literally true."

Truth be told, when Biden said he did the math himself, it set off our alarms. And nothing personal, but when politicians say something is "literally true," we often find it literally isn't.

Biden seemed to be daring us to check this one. We took the bait and found his statement was Half True .