[dragonwriter]

> This is all to say that Esperanto is genuinely better as a second language for Europe and the Americas if not the world.

But the value of a second language isn't in how easy it is to learn (that's just saying it's low cost.)

The value is in the pool of people it lets you communicate with that your first language does not, and on that measure, Esperanto is particularly poor, compared to whichever of (in no particular order) English, Spanish, Mandarin, Arabic, French, and several others you don't already speak.

[D-Coder]

_One_ value of a second language is the pool of people it lets you communicate with. Another value is whether you can actually learn it well enough to use it.

[dragonwriter]

The second is not a value of the language, it is a measure of the cost to realize the communication value.

[D-Coder]

Cost is part of the value. If I can't afford a BMW, it has no value to me. If I will never become fluent in a language, it has no value to me (at least in some senses).