Are we worth half a million bucks?

I'm extremely grateful that I work for a church, full time, in youth ministry.
I'm grateful that I get to do something which I enjoy and find meaning in and I'm grateful because my family like to eat.

I don't know what the average full-time youth minister/pastor is paid per year. For the sake of this article I'm going to say $40,000 (that is about on par with what I found here and here).

With longevity being important and youth ministry being cyclic (getting in a new generation of kids every six years), I wonder, after a dozen years, does a church get a HALF A MILLION dollars worth?

Now, twelve years is a long time...
And spiritual (not to mention physical, emotional, relational, social, mental) transformation and development is impossible to measure...
And this can as easily apply to any ministry worker (children's, family, small groups, pastoral care, admin, associate, teaching, lead/head/senior minister)... 

BUT

If you went up to your average church and asked them to chip in $500,000 towards a ministry would they reconsider because the number is so substantially greater than 40K per year?

When weighed up against the way that large sum of money could be used, would they see it as a fair trade?

Additionally, if this money was viewed as a long-term investment not a rolling annual amount, would the evaluation of a ministries' effectiveness be different?

If nothing else, when such substantial numbers are thrown about, it should make those working in ministry sit back and consider the great, long-term, cost faithful people have made.