Here's the thing about describing bulk-level drug seizures in terms of their approximate street value: It's not real money, even when cops use conservative calculations. The dollar figure commonly cited in news stories is the estimated collective value of the drugs to thousands of end users who will never buy it. And, because drugs can get resold several times between wholesale and retail, the street-level figures are usually much higher than what the defendants paid for the drugs or what they would have sold them for.