The Nucleus figure is based on interviews with 117 employees at 76 different US companies, along with 28 IT administrators responsible for managing e-mail and other corporate applications.
Nucleus found that the average employee receives nearly 3,500 spam messages per year and says this causes an average loss in productivity per year per employee at 1.4%.
The firm also reckons that one full-time IT staff person is required for every 690 employees, just to manage spam and spam-related issues.
Meanwhile, the UK Government's All Party Parliamentary Internet Group hosted a Spam Summit to launch an investigation into unsolicited commercial e-mail. The Group exists to provide a discussion forum between new media industries and parliamentarians.
According to Silicon.com, Stephen Timms, the Minister for E-commerce and Competitiveness told those present that spam "isn't a problem which will be solved by legislation alone." TheRegister.co.uk quotes Timms adding, "Hopefully, it's possible for us to come up with an EU-US approach and the All Party Parliamentary Internet Group's inquiry will highlight ideas."