Comments on: How Much is $787 Billion?

By: Frank Polenose

Frank Polenose — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 11:27:13 +0000

Nobody can comprehend these kind of numbers - no way.
Frank @ Payday Loans / Quick Loans

By: The David

The David — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 04:10:32 +0000

Thanks! I totally screwed that up.

I accidentally used $78.7 million as my baseline because that's how many $10,000 bills you'd have if you have $787 billion.

Thanks for the heads up, and this only goes to show the importance of double checking your math.

By: Alan

Alan — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 16:56:56 +0000

if a family made $50,223 a year, it would take them 15,670,111 years to make that amount, not 1,566 years. This kind of a large difference. (787,000,000,000 / 50,223). In your calculations, you must have left out 2 zeros in the billions calculations.

By: The David

The David — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 14:05:38 +0000

It's one of my favorite series too, so I'm glad you liked it! It's not the first – or the last – time you'll see me quote Hitchhiker's.

I also quoted it in this post: http://www.pimpyourfinances.com/2008/11/what-to..., and will have an entire article about Hictchhiker's at some point in the future.

By: David Leonhardt

David Leonhardt — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 13:19:15 +0000

How can I resist commenting on an article that starts with a quote from one of my favorite novels (trilogy, actually). I tipd this post.

By: The David

The David — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 16:29:41 +0000

Thanks. I just have trouble with these unfathomable numbers, especially when they're thrown around like it's no big deal.

And I degree…it is depressing. I was tempted to include a list of other things the money could've paid for, but I decided that would get too depressing and too political way too quickly.

By: Jeff@StretchyDollar

Jeff@StretchyDollar — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 15:58:19 +0000

That's a cool way to look at it. Slightly depressing, but still cool.