Congress stuffed $1.1 trillion into the recent spending bill (yr. 2014), didn’t bother to consider or even read the contents, and promptly passed it into law. It got me to thinking about exactly how much money $1.1 trillion really is. Here’s a little perspective on that.
FUN FACT: A trillion one-dollar bills would weigh about 2,200,000,000 lbs., and it would take 3,121 Boeing 747 Dreamlifters, loaded to the max, to fly it to . . . where-ever your Congressman wants to send it – or Congressperson, to be politically correct.
FUN FACT: If my wife went shopping and spent $1,000,000 every day, 365 days a year, it would take her 3,013 years to spend $1.1 trillion. (She says she’d like to give it a try.)
FUN FACT: If she decided not to spend it (unlikely) she could lay it out in one-dollar bills, end-to-end, which would form a line about 104,166,667 miles long. If she did that, and told me to wrap it around the world, I would have to go around the world at least 4,183 times.
SCARY FACT: It’s instructive to note that $1.1 trillion looks like $1,100,000,000,000.00 when it shows its zeroes. That’s why the politicians always write it as “$1.1 T”. Being very thoughtful, they don’t want to frighten us. And, they don’t want us to worry about what they are buying with so much money. Ya’ gotta love ‘em.
TERRIFYING FACT: The 435 members of our House of Representatives will each spend an average of $16,200,000 every single work-day to burn through the $1.1 trillion in one year. (This assumes 3 work-days a week, which considering long weekends, holidays, vacations, fund-raisers, foreign excursions and recesses is pretty generous.) Be assured, they certainly will find time to spend this much money, and a good deal more even if they have to work an extra day once in a while. After all, it’s their job . . . right?