One Trillion Dollars

[Cowpox]

    Lately, we have been hearing this amount bandied every time we watch the news.

    I was getting so used to it, that I had almost become comfortable with this figure.

    This evening, I overheard a young gentleman in his late twenties, who will be paying for this stimulus package for the rest of his life, make a statement which put a trillion onto perspective for me.

    "If someone gave you a trillion dollars the day Jesus died, and you started spending it at the rate of a million dollars a day, EVERY day, as of today, you would have spent something under 733 billion dollars, and would still have a few hundred years to go, until you are broke."

     The idea of these idiots in Washington wanting to spend that amount with one stroke of the pen, now scares the bejeebers out of me !

[Land_Owner]

In my youth, ten thousand dollars was a lot of money and hearing about "common" folks with a net worth of over one-hundred thousand dollars was rare indeed.   There were always the Rockerfellers, the Hursts, Firestones, and others with assets exceeding our wildest imaginations.  Government budgets were being measured in terms of tens of millions (that is one and 7-zeros).

In the mid 60's the ceiling of a quarter million dollars for personal net worth was struck and Government budgets were beginning to reach one hundred million (one and 8-zeros). 

In the 70's a half million dollar personal net worth was not uncommon and Government budgets were reaching half a billion (five and 8-zeros).

It took a decade or two but in the 90's a few INDIVIDUALS  had reached the personal net worth of over a billion dollars (one and 9-zeros).

What is one million dollars any more?  You have heard that amount spoken so often it is common and its mystic has worn off.  "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?", the Power Ball lottery, Vegas, Television all combined numb our minds.

Personal net worths have reached the Billion dollar and ten billion dollar ceilings (one and 10-zeros), and for one or two individuals the one hundred Billion dollar ceiling (one and 11-zeros).

Today, the Government is branding about with Trillion dollar deficits  and Trillion dollar budgets (one and 12-zeros). 

We dont even measure hugh amounts like we did with smaller ones adding "ten" and "one hundred" and "one thousand" as prefixes to HUGE amounts.

Here is how it looks:
10^2........100....................................One Hundred
10^3........1,000.................................One Thousand
10^4........10,000................................Ten Thousand
10^5........100,000..............................One Hundred Thousand
10^6........1,000,000...........................One Million
10^7........10,000,000..........................Ten Million
10^8........100,000,000........................One Hundred Million
10^9........1,000,000,000......................One Billion [or One Thousand Million]
10^10......10,000,000,000....................Ten Billion [or Ten Thousand Million]
10^11......100,000,000,000...................One Hundred Billion [or One Hundred Thousand Million]
10^12......1,000,000,000,000................One Trillion [or One Million Million]

My hand is raised, I need to be excused, my brain is full...

[Elijah Gunn]

I knew a billion was a "thousand million",but was surprised that a trillion is a million million! It doesn't matter anyway because the money is fiat, and only has worth because enough people believe that it does.
There is nothing that backs up our money like gold ,and silver used to. Other than our faith in it.
I found a good read about how our current money system came into existence. It's entitled," I want the earth plus 5%."  It is written in the form of a fable, so it is not a boring , or technical thing to read. Just google it,and click on the top one listed.

[Savage .250]

  "Change".........is very expensive.   

[Land_Owner]

We shall see and FEEL how "free" it all is with the Left Hand Accounting that now in place in Washington .

[Cement Man]

Not only are the numbers obscene because they are the result of empty strategy, poor evaluation, and dubious results - these dollars are financing social and cultural agendas that have nothing to do with economic stimulus.  Not only we are going into a bottomless pit of deficit, this mess is randomly permeated with a liberal social agenda.

Nice post Land_Owner.  I remember my first full time job in 1965, before I went into the service.  I worked in the executive offices of a steel company.  $10K annually was THE threshold for the "big shots".

[magooch]

Gee, I had no idea I was in the "Big Shot" catagory in the sixties.

[Cement Man]

Gee, I had no idea I was in the "Big Shot" catagory in the sixties.

and have maintained that status for all these years.........