The headline in the Washington Post reads: House Offers $825 Billion Stimulus. That’s a lot of cash. But it’s such a large number that it’s difficult to wrap your mind around it.
Here are a couple of riddles I came up with to put that number in perspective.
Riddle #1
Let’s say you had an unlimited supply of $100 bills, wrapped in packs of 100. That’s $10,000 per pack.
If you began throwing the $10,000 packs into your fireplace at a rate of one pack every second, 24 hours a day, how long would it take until you had burned through $825 billion?
Answer below.
Riddle #2
Let’s say you have $825 billion in your checking account and it can be yours only if you spend it all in one calendar year. How much money would you have to spend every minute, 24 hours a day?
Answer below.
Answer to riddle #1:
2 years, 7 months and 11 days
Answer to riddle #2:
$1.6 million
More about the word “billion” on Wikipedia.
That really boggles my mind. It’s a shame our government will burn through it in way less time than that.
Anita