Flashback – The Blame Game

Many Americans stumble through life following rules of thumb they heard somewhere while making no attempt to verify their effectiveness: drink 8 glasses of water a day; avoid eating fat; wolf down Vitamin C for a cold; shun fast food, etc. They take the same attitude toward so many myths: fear GMOs and food additives; fear nuclear power; fear fluoridation of drinking water; fear vaccines; worry about (extremely rare) school shootings and child abduction and more. When anything goes wrong they look for someone else to blame and to the government to fix it. Many legislators understand and relish their role as savior, which allows this lack of responsibility to continue.

 

Here from almost 7 years ago are my comments on this tendency to blame and depend on others to help.

[I just finished reading a book called Scapegoat:  A History of Blaming Other People. In it the author tells how, back as far as the Garden of Eden, we have been finding others to blame for our problems and shortcomings. We have blamed foreigners, other religions, the rich, the poor, bankers, God, Satan, witches, priests, kings and animals, even the weather. I think he left out all the “Bigs”: big business, big pharma, big tobacco, big oil, big government, big banks and the rest. No one takes responsibility and it began with Adam blaming "the woman" and Eve blaming the serpent.

This was coincident with two news articles: one about a common whipping boy, MacDonald’s, and the other about our lack of faith in the government.

The first is in the form of a video.  A high school science teacher from Iowa challenged his students to develop a diet for him based purely on the menu from McDonald’s. They were instructed to vary his meals and keep the total intake of calories and fats to within set guidelines. After eating three meals everyday from MacDonald’s and beginning an exercise program where he walked for 45 minutes a day, he lost 37 pounds and his cholesterol dropped from 249 to 170. This flies in the face of popular opinion and documentaries like “Super-size Me” that try to shift the blame from individual behavior to the fast food industry. As the teacher says, “It’s our choices that make us fat, not MacDonald’s.” Behavior has consequences.

The second related piece of news is the results of a recent poll showing that about 70% of Americans have little faith in government. “The percentage of Americans saying the nation is heading in the right direction hasn't topped 50 in about a decade.” Many are looking for fundamental changes in the structure of government, as “61 percent are pessimistic about the system of government overall and the way leaders are chosen.” The underlying premise here goes against the idea of responsibility as we look to the government to solve our problems and worry about their inability to do so, instead of being more self-reliant.

Perhaps it’s time to stop looking for someone else to blame, whether it be the government, fast food, or any of the other popular targets. It’s time to start solving our problems with better choices all the time.]

National Debt – What, Me Worry?

If you care about the country going bankrupt, it doesn’t matter who you vote for. Both parties seem to be indifferent to it. There's only a small difference in the size of their trillion-dollar spending bills.

 

Below are two graphs. The first shows, from the best source I could find, the spending and revenue of the United States over the last 30 years. We actually had a small surplus in the last two years of the Clinton Administration. Then things went south. Bush started a couple of unnecessary wars and added Medicare Part D. Obama continued those wars, failed to take ISIS seriously and threw in some stimulus. Trump wanted to build up the military, already the largest in the world, but the democrats would only agree if they got a proportional boost to their favorite domestic programs. The lines clearly show what happened. 

 

 

Just as a thought experiment, suppose the rate of increase of federal government spending had remained the same as it was from 1990 to 2000 under Bush (R) and Clinton (D) – not the same level of spending, but the same rate of increase. Here is what that would have looked like. 

 

Even with the two tax cuts that politicians told us would cause huge problems; many of those years would have run a surplus fed by growth in the economy over the past 8 years or so. 

 

Now this exact scenario would likely not have been possible due to the increased Social Security outlays as the Baby Boomers hit retirement age. But still, if you ask people over the age of 45 how life was during the 1990s, how well needs were being met; the majority would say that things were fine. 

 

The question is: how much of that extra spending went to real improvement, how much was pure waste, and how much went to buying your vote (using your own money to do it)?

 

We hope for responsible leaders; but when it comes to spending, politicians take the attitude of Alfred E. Newman, the fictitious mascot of Mad Magazine.

Flashback - How Big is Big?

Over seven years ago I wrote about how those numbers used so casually by the news media and politicians to describe government spending are unbelievably large. Most people can’t and don’t even try to imagine the size of them. At one time numbers this big were only used to describe the vastness of outer space. Today government spending is astronomical.

Here is the original post, with the updated spending and debt numbers in parentheses to show not only the size but the growth as Washington continues to ignore the problem.

[As discussions of the budget and debt limit make the news, we hear about billions and trillions of dollars. These numbers are so enormous that I can’t even picture them.

A million is big, but the Roman Empire, as big as it was, managed well with no Roman Numerals higher than 1000 (M). Today, Americans dream of having a million dollars. Everyone "wants to be a millionaire." Based on the average income of about $50,000, it takes 20 years just to earn $1 million (before taxes). At the rate of a dollar a minute, it would take almost 2 years (without sleeping) to spend it all. A million miles is the distance an average automobile driver in the US travels in about 74 years. To most of us, a million is a very big number.

A billion is one thousand million. If you threw a billion one-dollar bills into a fire at a rate of one per second, you could keep it burning for 32 years. A billion dollars represents the earnings for 500 of those average households over a lifetime. A billion miles equals 2,093 trips to the moon and back. These days we hear billions of dollars treated like pocket change.

A trillion is one thousand billion or a million million. It's a huge number. It’s hard to imagine any comparison that even makes sense. A $17 trillion-dollar debt ($26.5 trillion) divided equally among all the citizens of the US comes out to $54,000 ($80,300) each, $216,000 ($321,200) for a family of four.  A child born today is instantly $54,000 ($80,300) in debt. If you took a trillion one-dollar bills and glued them together at the edges, you could construct a quilt over 100 miles long and 40 miles wide. It could cover the entire states of Delaware and Rhode Island, plus the District of Columbia with some left over. A trillion seconds is more than 410 lifetimes, back to the time of the Neanderthals. It takes all the drivers in the US working together about 7½ years to burn a trillion gallons of gasoline.

A trillion is an inconceivably huge number. Even a billion is very, very large, yet in the coming weeks and months we will hear news reporters and politicians mentioning billions and trillions of dollars like they are commonly understood. Doesn’t the fact that our government owes nearly $17 trillion ($26.5 trillion) that we and our children are responsible for deserve more than this ho-hum treatment?]

No Magic Money Tree

For years I have been patiently explaining how unbelievable it is that people go through life putting their faith in some magic money tree to take care of their problems. They spend instead of save, then stress about the cost of education and retirement. They expect a lifeline to bail them out – money off some magic tree. Buy now, pay later, and don’t worry about the consequences, just continue to borrow and play the lottery.

As the government increases spending, it makes no impression on them except to feel good that some people are getting more goods and services for free. If a big business is fined or sued, people assume there is some invisible bank account to cover the expenses. (Maybe the CEO will take a pay cut.) Americans fail to see the unbreakable link, either direct or indirect, between these expenditures and their own wallets.

Here are the facts. There is NO magic money tree! The money always comes from somewhere, and that always has ramifications for every single citizen: higher prices, higher taxes, a sluggish economy or a bigger share of the National Debt. The poor are usually disproportionately hurt.

When the business gets an unexpected expense, they raise prices and pass it along to their customers. This is easy when it’s due to a new government regulation that affects the entire industry. No one has an advantage, and everyone’s prices go up to cover the added cost. If it affects only one company and raising prices makes them non-competitive, they risk going out of business or downsizing, and people lose jobs.

When the government increases spending, it comes from taxes and debt. For many years lawmakers seem to have more interest in using some combination of lower taxes and increased spending to buy votes than in acting responsibly. (In fact, they characterize a lower than expected increase as a “cut.”) This has pushed the National Debt to unimaginable levels, currently over $26 trillion. Now Congress is fighting with the President over whether to spend $3 trillion or only $1 trillion on another emergency COVID package! Where do they think that money is coming from? 

The debt, in the form of government bonds is interest-only. Payments do not lower what is owed. Growing debt leads to more interest, which holds back economic growth. Fiscal irresponsibility can lead to inflation, which also affects everyone.

Many economists tell us not to worry, despite what happened to Greece in the recent past when their debt got out of hand. In 2017, years after the initial crisis, its economy grew by only 1.4% with unemployment around 22% and one-third of the population living below the poverty line. The EU bailed them out to some degree, but there is no entity big enough to bail out the US.

It’s a simple matter of critical thinking to understand that this issue is going to become a crisis some day, but as the problem grows, no one seems concerned. Behavior has not changed. Politicians still win elections by promising more spending and programs. Even numbers in the trillions get a ho-hum response. 

Everyone must assume there is some magic money tree somewhere; but there isn’t. 

Different Cultures, Different Rules

A story about an incident in 2006 is suddenly getting a lot of attention on social media. An American woman temporarily working in Iceland “went from feeling a lump in her breast to getting checked out and assured that it was benign in the space of a single day, and for $3.” She posted the story of her experience on Twitter.

This gets many people stirred up, asking: Why can’t we do this in the United States? Some politicians think we can and are promising changes, but the comparisons are not as straightforward as we’d like them to be.

Iceland is a small, island nation in the North Atlantic with a population of about 350,000. For comparison, the city of Minneapolis has a population about 425,000. The entire country is smaller than many American cities. 

But it’s not just a matter of scale. Taking it a step further, that population is very homogenous. About 91% of the residents of Iceland are Icelandic citizens and only 16% are foreign-born. Unlike the US, the population is concentrated. Ninety-nine percent live in urban areas and 60% live very close to the capital. Furthermore, about 72% belonged to the same religion, the state Evangelical Lutheran Church of Iceland.

Back to our comparison example – where Iceland has homogeneity, Minneapolis has diversity. Its population is approximately 64% white from various heritages, 19% African American, 10% Hispanic and 7% various other ethnicities. It is the home of more than 50 denominations and religions.

How important is this homogeneity in the smooth operation of a more socially oriented society? Denmark believes it is vital to maintain the order and necessary shared values. “Beginning at the age of 1, [mostly Muslim immigrant] ‘ghetto children’ must be separated from their ‘ghetto parents’ for 25 hours per week for mandatory instruction in so-called ‘Danish values,’ which includes learning about the language and the traditions of Christmas and Easter, The New York Times reported in July 2018.”

(Again for comparison Denmark is about 35% larger than Maryland in area with about 5% fewer people. These are much smaller countries whose people share a common background and history.)

But there is no free lunch and no $3 health service without a huge subsidy. Here is a simplified comparison to make the point.

After a $5,145 deduction, Icelanders pay 36.94% of income up to about $85,000 and 46.24% on income above that. On top of that is a value added tax (VAT) of 24% on most goods and services, but a few categories are subject to a reduced rate of 11% (e.g. food, hotels, newspapers, books, and utilities).

Everyone in Iceland pays at least at the same level as the highest tax bracket in the US, 36.94% compared to 37%. They don’t “soak the rich;” they take it from everyone. On the other hand, their corporate tax rate is among the lowest.

In Minneapolis a single taxpayer owes no more than 17% on the first $85,000 after a standard deduction of $12,200 and pays about 8% sales tax, but not on food. (Sales tax and VAT are not identical, but the economic burden of VAT falls on the final consumer.)

Using those numbers, a single taxpayer earning only $20,000 in the US pays $780, whereas for the same situation in Iceland the tax bill would be roughly $5,500. When the money is spent, it is taxed again at a rate up to 16% more.

On another point, access to doctors is slightly better. Iceland has a physician ratio of 3.62 doctors per 1000. In the US it’s 2.3 doctors per 1000.

These and many other considerations are ignored by those who want to make simplistic comparisons, comparisons that in reality are light-years away from apples to apples. It would be nice to have all the benefits and not have to make any of the sacrifices, not have to adapt to an entire new set of values and expectations, not have to live within a completely different culture. (The US cannot even agree to have one official language!) But there are no simple answers.

Medicare For All?

People who are excited about the idea of “Medicare for all” obviously have as meager an understanding of Medicare as they do of Social Security. In fact Medicare is much more complicated than Social Security. It’s not a matter of walking into the doctor’s office, showing an ID card, receiving services and leaving without a bill.

When Medicare was passed in 1965, the government tried to follow a private insurance model. As a result they came up with two parts. Generally speaking, Part A covers hospitalization, and Part B covers regular visits to the doctor. But just like private insurance there are many details about what is covered and what is not.

In most cases Part A has no premium, but it does have a deductible of $1,364 for the first 60 days of Medicare-covered inpatient hospital care. Note that it’s the same for one day as it is for 60 days, so several short hospital stays can become quite expensive. From the 61^st through the 90^th day a $341 per day charge applies. 

The standard monthly premium for Medicare Part B enrollees is $135.50 for 2019. Some pay less and some pay more depending on an income scale. The annual deductible for all Medicare Part B beneficiaries is $185.

This government website gives more details of both parts, but it is clearly not free healthcare with the government picking up the tab.

But there is more. “With Part B coinsurance you typically pay 20% of the Medicare-approved cost of most services, after your deductible is met.” The bill comes from the provider showing the standard charge, Medicare reduces it to the Medicare-approved charge and pays 80%, then the remaining 20% is the patient's responsibility.

But there are also three classes of doctors. The 20% applies to participating doctors. “Non-participating doctors have not signed an agreement with Medicare and therefore might not ‘accept assignment’ for all of their services. A non-participating doctor may take the payment…for 80% of Medicare’s approved cost. But he or she can charge you 15% of the approved cost on top of the 20%.” Doctors who do not accept Medicare assignment can charge in full at the time of the visit.

Part D was added early in this century to cover prescription costs. It is a nightmare of private insurance options, premiums and differing formularies (a list of what drugs are and aren’t covered at different levels by each insurer). And what is available differs by location.

Because Medicare doesn’t cover everything, private companies sell supplemental insurance, sometimes called Medigap plans. There are 10 plans available in most states. “These plans are labeled Plan A, B, C, D, F, G, K, L, M and N, and each plan covers a different set of basic benefits.” How’s that for an additional headache?

Besides the complexity and added costs, two additional problems arise: reimbursement levels and funding.

The Medicare reimbursement to doctors and hospitals is typically lower than private health insurance and much lower than the actual billed rate. (One of my recent bills for a simple annual checkup came in at 60% of the billed rate.) This can discourage providers, who must cover their costs. This source, for example, is not as current as I’d like but “a Kaiser Family Foundation analysis found that 93 percent of non-pediatric primary care physicians were participating providers with Medicare in 2015, but only 72 percent were accepting new Medicare patients.” In addition, a recent change to a flat rate payment program may discourage doctors from accepting Medicare for more challenging medical conditions. Will it soon become difficult, even under the current system, to find a participating doctor? Will fewer young people be inclined to study medicine if the program is expanded, further squeezing doctors' ability to earn an adequate living? All the insurance in the world does not help if you can't find a doctor.

Finally, there is the problem of funding. The money taken from each paycheck (with a matching amount from the employer) pays 88% of the cost of Part A, but the Part A trust fund is projected to be depleted in 2026. This may result in the institution of premiums for Part A. Premiums paid for Part B contribute only 26% to the cost with the rest covered by general government tax revenue. “Medicare spending was 15 percent of total federal spending in 2018, and is projected to rise to 18 percent by 2029.” (This website has some excellent graphs showing current and projected costs with no change to the system, particularly in Figures 6 and 7.)

As it is today the system is complex, and anything but free. It has many of the drawbacks of private insurance systems including waiting months for the paperwork to arrive. Already, many wonder how the government can afford to keep it up. 

This rather long explanation only scratches the surface. “Medicare for all” is easy to promise, but extremely difficult to explain. And, as I wrote years ago, the only way to reduce the cost of healthcare is to address the cost directly in ways that introduce transparency and competition, not by making it easier to pay ever-increasing prices.

Behavior Matters More Than Politics

Tomorrow is Election Day and many people will be going to the polls hoping to send their candidates to Washington or to the state capital to solve all our problems, or at least the most pressing ones.

The problem is, as I have written so many times here, the solutions to most of those problems lie not in Washington but with individuals choosing better behaviors. More evidence of this came last week in an article from CNN with the headline: “How to evade the leading cause of death in the United States.” 

The biggest killer of Americans between the ages of 1 and 44 in 2016 (the last year with available data) was unintentional injury. The detailed explanation shows that these are directly related to behavior, actions and decisions of the victims or of those close to them.

The first category is basic home safety. The main problem here is fires, which killed 2,775 people and injured 11,025 more. Most fires started when someone was cooking. Experts recommend simple things like having working smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors along with a fire extinguisher in every house. Many cities have volunteer programs to inspect and install smoke alarms for people who cannot afford them. Other home accidents are falls and drownings.

Next comes basic road safety. Here CNN reviews the requirements for children’s car seats and booster seats. But a huge problem is distracted driving, especially cellphone use while driving. Do we really need more laws to fix this?

Third on the list is basic bicycle safety. After checking the bike itself to make sure it is in good working order, it’s important to make sure others easily see you. Reflectors, bright clothing and a light at night are critical accessories. The article reminds bikers to ride on the right side of the road, with the traffic, obey other traffic laws and watch the road ahead for obstacles. “Cyclists also suggest tucking your right pant leg into your sock and your shoelaces into your shoe, so they don’t get caught in your bike chain.” And most important, always wear a helmet.

This is only a short list of direct causes of death, but add as indirect causes: smoking, eating and drinking to excess. These are related to the top three causes of death in the country overall: heart disease, cancer and lower respiratory diseases. They are also descriptions of problematic behavior.

And notice the use of the word basic in all the safety advice above. All these life-saving suggestions relate to behavior. They are precautions everyone can take to make life safer for themselves and their loved ones. Collective action in these areas alone could raise life expectancy in America significantly (without a single new law to protect us).

None of these precautions needs any government action, although the government is always happy to intervene where we fail to take responsibility for ourselves and our loved ones or show we don't have the discipline to kick destructive habits. (Look at the opioid epidemic.) So as you vote tomorrow, don’t expect miracles. Your future life and happiness are, for the most part, really in your own hands. That is true of every one of us.

Is Social Security Really "My Money"?

It’s a common argument among retirees, encouraged by organizations like AARP, that Social Security is my money and the government cannot be tinkering with it. It’s strange how this argument never came up years ago when the government decided to add an annual cost of living increase. Tinkering in the positive direction is fine. 

But advocates take advantage of retirees lack of perspective, critical thinking and economic understanding by pushing all kinds of myths and untruths to get them riled up enough to vote in a particular way.

Lack of perspective is evident when the announcement of the year’s cost of living adjustment is routinely met with complaints  that it is not really enough to keep up with inflation. They don’t understand that it was never in the original plan and any increase should be greeted with gratitude.

Lacking critical thinking, most don’t even make the effort to do a little simple research to find out how Social Security works. It’s clear that it’s not your money simply by the fact that when someone dies before retirement age, the SSA does not treat it like an inheritance to be divided among next of kin. No, the money was paid into Social Security and will be used for Social Security purposes.

There is also the lack of understanding about the government having “robbed” the Social Security trust fund and spent all the money on other projects. Consider this. Social Security since its beginning and up until this year has been collecting more money than it was paying out. The surplus had to be invested somewhere.

They can’t put it into a commercial bank or credit union. That would be an unfair windfall for that bank relative to its competition and would likely involve political favoritism. Investing in the stock market could not be justified, seen as “gambling with my retirement,” and equally problematic from the favoritism standpoint. Likewise corporate bonds are out of consideration.

What’s left? Government bonds. And what are government bonds used for? They are used to borrow money for the government to spend! The government has not been robbing from the “trust fund.” They have been borrowing the money with an obligation to pay it back, just as they must eventually pay back other bonds they sell to raise money when they spend more than they have. (They face that obligation now, as contributions are no longer sufficient to cover promised benefits.)

Finally, Social Security does not favor the rich. It is skewed in the opposite direction. Taking a look at the generic benefit calculator on the SSA website shows the difference. In one case, a person born in 1958, earning $50,000 per year, and planning to retire at 66 years old will receive $1460 per month (estimated). Leaving all assumptions the same and only changing the earnings to $100,000 gives an estimated monthly payment of $2276. Double the earnings and the benefit increases by only 56%.

 This is not my first tirade about Social Security (see here, here and here) and will probably not be my last. I just get very frustrated when people continue to fall for all those lies without doing a lick of work to investigate.

A Closer Look at Spending

Back in June I posted some graphs that I created based on data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.  The point was that the government seems to have the same problems with discipline as many citizens. Their appetite exceeds their resources. They spend for today often without distinguishing between wants and needs while pushing the consequences to the future - sometimes referred to as kicking the can down the road. 

A close look at the numbers shows that moderate austerity should have been fairly easy and that following a more conservative pace would have left the country in a much better position. 

Last time I posted this message on a Friday, and it ran over a weekend.  I thought the information was important enough to show again.

   

My source was the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis website: quarterly government expenditures and receipts, seasonally adjusted from 1^st Quarter 1990 to 1^st Quarter 2018.

The first graph shows government expenditures.  There is an apparent acceleration in spending shortly after 2001. The slope changes noticeably. 

The next graph shows that the increased spending was real and sustained.  By taking the average quarterly increase for the 1990 to 2000 and applying it to the rest of the data, I showed (in red) what would happen if the spending had increased at only the same percentage rate.  It's still an increase but not nearly as steep. (The blue shows actual spending from the above graph, so the apparent increase was real!)

That's the spending story.  Now see what happens when we add government receipts (overlaid in green). There was a budget surplus in the late 1990s and even with the tax cuts of 2001, there would have been another from 2006 to mid-2008, had the spending not gotten out of hand.  And again around the 2013 - 2015 time frame any deficit would have been minimal.

Just like that new car or vacation we can't really afford, the new government programs seem to be too tempting to pass up. It seems painless because borrowed money today doesn't have to be paid back until later. But as we know from our personal experience the consequences are just around the corner. Unfortunately the decision makers may be long gone when any government consequences arrive. It will be our children and grandchildren left to pay the bill.  This shows a lack of discipline, perspective and responsibility 

Discipline and Spending Sprees

We all have problems with discipline from time to time, especially in the area of spending. Some people are forced to live from paycheck to paycheck out of necessity unable to add anything to savings. Others spend what they have without distinguishing between wants and needs pushing the consequences to the future.

When we hear news about government spending we expect some level of responsibility, assuming that new spending is necessary and productive and that going into debt to support that spending is a prudent choice.  But Americans rarely look closely at the numbers, taking the word of their favorite news outlet or economist as to the wisdom of these choices.

But looking into the numbers is not that difficult and the results should be surprising, even shocking to almost everyone – not because the numbers are unimaginably huge, billions and trillions, but because the perspective over 30 years is so revealing. It’s like raising children.  As a parent you don’t notice the children growing in the same way that a distant friend or relative, who looks at the latest Christmas card photo, does.  It sneaks up on you.

As I said, the numbers are easy to find.  My source is the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.  They post on their website quarterly government expenditures and receipts, seasonally adjusted.  The graphs below represent a different look at each from 1^stQuarter 1990 to 1^stQuarter 2018.

The first graph shows government expenditures for that period.  What's striking is the apparent acceleration in spending shortly after 2001.

The next graph shows that the increase was real.  I took the average quarterly increase for the 1990 to 2000 period and applied it to the rest of the data. The red bars show the continuation of the trend as a percent increase – rather than as a straight-line trend, which would be lower.  The actual is now in blue.  The appetite for spending seems to have increased disproportionately.

Finally, when I apply government receipts, shown in green, it’s surprising that, even with the much-maligned tax cuts of 2001, had spending continued to increase at the same pace, there would have been another budget surplus from 2006 to mid-2008 just as there was at the beginning of the century, and we would have come very close to still another around 2013 – 2015.

Readers can draw their own conclusions. But perhaps we have a truly representative form of government where elected officials mirror the behavior of many citizens who cannot keep spending under control, acting as if the wants of today are more important than the needs of tomorrow.  Let our children and grandchildren worry about it.  (Keep in mind that the numbers on the x-axis are in billions of dollars!)

When Numbers Get Too Large

There is a concept in probability called the Law of Large Numbers.  Basically, it says that the more attempts you make at a measured activity, the more accurately you will understand the distribution of that activity.  For example, you may get a lucky streak at a casino or racetrack and come out ahead on a given day; but if you play long enough, you will lose.  The rules of the game stack the odds slightly against you.  Short term streaks occur, but results are predictable in the long run.

If you toss a coin ten times, you will get an equal number of heads and tails only about one in four tries.  More than 75% of the time you would get a different result.  But toss it a thousand times and the chance of getting closer to 50% heads and 50% tails is much better.  As you increase the number of coin tosses (or any similar activity), you are much more likely to be close to the expected outcome.  The same is true of experiments and studies as I have fussed about many times in the past when writing about science and medicine.  The bigger the sample size or number of trials, the more likely the results will be consistent with real life.

But I have created a different law of large numbers.  It states that it is almost impossible for anyone to really understand numbers greater than one million.  To most people numbers commonly tossed around in politics and science, like billions and trillions, are just words designating a big number or a whole bunch.  Even one million is beyond the grasp of most.

A million is a thousand thousands.  Counting to one million at one number per second nine hours a day would take a month – not time very well spent.  A stack of a million one dollar bills would stand almost 360 feet high and weigh over 1.1 tons.  A million of anything (or one chance in a million) is extremely hard to picture.  Such a large number means very little to most of us in real terms.

Now a billion is a thousand millions.  Politicians in Washington talk about a billion dollars as if it’s pocket change – a billion here, a billion there.  Here is an example given by a teacher to a class of seventh graders.  “If I gave you $1,000 a day, seven days a week, how long would it take you to collect 1 billion dollars?”   Most guessed around 4 years.  The answer is 2,737 years, 10 months, 7 days.  If this exercise started in the manger on the first Christmas, you would still be over 700 years away from collecting your billionth dollar.

A trillion is a thousand billion.  Count all the hairs on all the heads of everyone in a football stadium.  That’s a measly 6 billion or so.  To get a trillion of anything, load 38 and a half dump trucks like the one shown here with fine sand and count all the grains of sand – incomprehensible!

 Photo Credit:   http://www.earthhaulers.com

Today our national debt hovers above 20 trillion dollars.  How big is that number?  If everyone in the US cancelled holiday shopping and sent all that money to pay off the debt, American children would be without Christmas for over 30 years – no tree, no lights, no presents, no special meal, just empty stockings for a generation and a half.

Perhaps the lack of urgency about government spending is due to the fact that those numbers are so big, bigger than anyone is able to grasp or imagine.