At least bring common sense to the table
… In layman’s terms … humm?
Published on February 3, 2011 By BoobzTwo In US Domestic

How big is a Trillion of … anything? "1" followed by 12 zeros (1,000,000,000,000) or for the more astute, 1012. Here are some amusements concerning one trillion of something’s ... To gain perspective:

  1. 1012 Seconds: =~16.7 billion minutes = ~277.8 million hours = ~11.6 million days = ~31.7 thousand years.
  2. 1012 Dollars: If spent at $1/second = $60/minute = $3,600/hour = $86,400/day =~ $31.6 million /Year … for ~31.7 thousand years.
  3. 1012 Dollar bills (6 in. long): Laid end to end would reach the sun leaving you $49.6 billion for your effort.
  4. 1012 Dollar bills (.0043 in. thick): Stacked = 4,300,000,000 in. = 358,333,333 ft. = 67,866 miles (~ 1/3 the distance to the moon). Now if you take this stack and roll it down at the equator, it would wrap around the Earth almost 2 ¾ times.
  5. 1012 Dollar bills (2.5 in wide): 2,500,000,000,000 in. = 208,333,333,333 feet = 39,457,071 miles … get the picture? [One is limited here only by their imagination, hehehe.]

While we are on the subject though … these kinds of things could have been paid for in full with $1 trillion if only …

  1. … could have purchased all the goods and services produced in Australia for ONE YEAR.
  2. … could have run our Government for 103 days
  3. … could have funded all the military of every NATO country.
  4. … could have paid for every US military intervention since 9/11.
  5. … could have paid the rent for every renter in the US for 3 years.
  6. … could have paid the mortgage payments or every homeowner in the US for 14 months.
  7. … could have repurchased all the home foreclosures in 2007 and 2008.
  8. ... could have paid for an additional 11 weeks’ vacation for every American worker.
  9. … could have (when adjusted for inflation)  … Paid for the New Deal and the Marshal Plan (*5).
  10. $1012 = the market value of all the stocks traded on the Toronto stock exchange.

I guess none of these things were deemed important by the current administration which seems strange considering their benevolent rhetoric. But the sad truth is that one trillion dollars is not even enough to pay for 1/10th of the current Government bailout, go figure.

Disconnected as usual!!!


Comments
on Feb 04, 2011

I guess none of these things were deemed important by the current administration which seems strange considering their benevolent rhetoric

Since when has any politician told the naked truth?  He wants to "freeze" spending - at a 1.5 trillion dollar deficit per year!

on Feb 09, 2011

Thanks Doc, I thought this was an amusing way to point out that a trillion dollars is much more than just a big number ... I thought perspective would help ... oh well

on Feb 10, 2011

I do not recall the author of the quote, but I do remember the gist of it.  Creeping decimalism.  When numbers get so large, they do become meaningless.  That is what a Trillion is now.

on Nov 30, 2011

Today we are expected to make trillion dollar decisions (by vote) and all we have to rely on are the jerks  (that got us where we are in the first place) words that this time they really know what they are doing, huh, something like that? Well it was the 1/2 trillion and the 1/4 trillion and the 100 million dollar deals that were just as meaningless that got us here and there appears to be no end in sight ... well … except for the obvious of course.