The culprit of the financial insanity is the University of Michigan, which is moving this single tree to make room for a $135 million expansion of its business school.

For the 2013-14 school year, in-state total cost of attending (tuition and fees) the University of Michigan was $13,189 and out-of-state total cost was $40,496. The cost to remove this tree was over 30 times the in-state cost and almost ten times the out-of-state cost.

That said, paying a full four years of the much more expensive out-of-state cost comes to roughly $162,000, which is only 40.5% of the cost to remove this tree.

Eric Owens of The Daily Caller has the story:

University Of Michigan Wastes $400,000 Moving A SINGLE TREE

The University of Michigan is spending some $400,000 to relocate a big tree less than 100 yards away.

A work crew has begun the long process of uprooting the bur oak tree, which has lived in a courtyard outside the flagship state school’s Ross School of Business, The Ann Arbor News reports.

The massive tree is 65 feet tall and almost five feet in diameter. It’s over 200 years old.

The reason for the move is a fancy, gleaming $135 million addition to the recently-built business school.

School officials say taxpayers aren’t paying for the expensive relocation project because the costs are coming out of a $200 million donation from Stephen Ross, a billionaire real-estate mogul who got his business degree at Michigan in 1962.

Tree-hugging students are taking credit for the $400,000 tree transfer.