Hint: it's more than NASA's entire 14-year budget … all because some of you don't understand how to drink properly.

There’s no doubt that not being able to handle your booze wrecks satanic havoc on your liver, but a new government report shows that it’s also costing the U.S. economy billions of dollars annually.

In fact, the Centers for Disease Control has determined that the loss of productivity from hungover individuals showing up late, not showing up at all or just showing up and pretending to do their job while praying for death costs the American economy a whopping $249 billion annually.

To put that number in perspective, NASA’s budget for the entire fiscal year of 2014 was $17 billion. They're figuring out how to colonize fucking Mars, and they're still only using seven percent of what hungover Americans cost taxpayers every year. The wasted quarter trillion dollars is equal to the entire annual gross domestic product of Palau. While Palau is busy exporting fish or whatever it is that they export, we waste an equal market share, because we can’t remember to hydrate our fat asses with water when we’re chugging Fireball at Buffalo Wild Wings. Hate us cause you ain’t us, Palau.

In addition to the economic toll of lost work productivity hungover Americans inflict, the CDC’s estimate of how much they cost the country includes spending on health care needed to treat alcohol-related issues as well as car crashes and crime attributable to excessive alcohol consumption. In 2010 alone, alcohol cost U.S. taxpayers $77 billion in reduced productivity at work according to the report published in the American Journal of Preventive Health. Calling-in with bar flu-like symptoms and whatever they mean by “other factors,” diminished productivity costs from binge drinking run closer to $90 billion.

The total cost of excessive drinking to the economy is also rising. In 2006, the last time the CDC made a similar calculation, excess drinking cost the economy $25 billion less than the current estimate. Seems like drinking ourselves into economic uselessness is about as American as apple pie or mid-range math scores.

The CDC notes, that much like the ebbs and flows of the world economy, quantifying abstract ideas like ‘economic damage’ is intrinsically inexact. If anything, the CDC claims their estimate “lowballs” the actual cost. This means they’ve actually underestimated our ability to party hardy, which we can assure them is on point.

Back to the drawing board, CDC. Let us know when you’re finished fiddling around on your abacus, we’ll just be over here ruining the economy because we’re too drunk and stupid to drink electrolytes.

Moral of the story? Drink your damn electrolytes when you’re boozing. Don’t make us tell you twice; we’re sick of paying higher taxes each year because you thought you were supposed to chase that shot with 13 more shots. Coconut water, children. Coconut water.