$1 Trillion – Consider This
Ever wondered what $1 trillion looks like? No? Well, one bright young thing who is clearly feeling secure enough in their job to whittle away an afternoon has.
All this talk about “stimulus packages” and “bailouts”… one billion dollars, one hundred billion dollars, eight hundred billion dollars… one trillion dollars… it’s easy to lose track of just how much money that actually is.
Let’s start with a $100 dollar bill – the largest U.S. denomination in general circulation.
A packet of one hundred $100 bills is less than 1/2 and inch thick and contains $10,000. It fits into your pocket easily and can certainly fuel a few weeks of decadent and indulgent behaviour.
Believe it or not, this next little pile is $1 million dollars (100 packets of $10,000). It would fit easily into a standard grocery bag and you could get around without anybody knowing just how much money you were in possession of.
However, while a measly $1 million looked a little unimpressive, $100 million is a little more respectable. It fits neatly on a standard pallet…
And $1 BILLION dollars… now we’re really getting somewhere…
Next we’ll look at ONE TRILLION dollars. This is that number we’ve been hearing so much about. What is a trillion dollars? Well, it’s a million million. It’s a thousand billion. It’s a one followed by 12 zeros.
You ready for this?
It’s pretty surprising.
Go ahead…
Scroll down…
Ladies and gentlemen… we give you $1 trillion dollars…
(And notice the pallets are double stacked.)
So the next time you hear someone toss around the phrase “trillion dollars”… that’s what they’re talking about.
femnoinge says:
I like that you separate fate from destiny. There is something to be said for trying to account for the idea that we can sometimes fail to fulfill our destiny.
Frank frank says:
Robert, that’s a part of the problem.
Create a big enough pile of money, and politicians can deal out “little” pieces to just about any special interest group. Good luck tracking it all.
If only everyone could just go out and earn $1 for every $1 they want to spend, instead of giving the new guy a shiny government credit card with no spending limit.
Fotograf says:
hey robert, now you think as politician, great!
Robert says:
could you send me a pallet
seems you would never miss it in the pile
Barry Tomkinson says:
Another way of thinking about trillions is as follows:
- one million seconds is about 11 days
- one billion seconds is about 30 years
- one trillion seconds 30 thousand years