Billions & billions

What is a billion?

Boone Pickens described it good back in the seventies when Dan Rather was interviewing him. Rather said, being a millionaire I need to ask you this question. Pickens replied excuse me son but I am not a millionaire, I am a billionaire. Rather said I am sorry billionaire, millionaire what's the difference? Pickens replied "Well son, if you were to stack $100 bills that would make up a million dollars, that stack would be 100 feet high. The same stack in $100 bills for a billion dollars would be slightly higher than the Empire State bldg., and that my son is the difference!"

billion - the true story about a Billion Dollars

This is too true to be very funny.

The next time you hear a politician use the

word 'billion' in a casual manner, think about

whether you want the politicians spending

YOUR tax money.

A billion is a difficult number to comprehend,

but one advertising agency did a good job of

putting that figure into some perspective in

one of its releases.

A. A billion seconds ago it was 1959.

B. A billion minutes ago Jesus was alive.

C. A billion hours ago our ancestors were

living in caves.

D. A billion days ago no-one walked on the earth on two
feet.

E. A billion dollars ago was only 8 hours and
20 minutes, at the rate our government is spending it.

While this thought is still fresh in our brain, let's take a look at
New Orleans. It's amazing what you can learn with some simple division . .

Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu (D), is presently asking the
Congress for $250 BILLION to rebuild
New Orleans. Interesting number. What does it mean?

A. Well, if you are one of 484,674 residents of

New Orleans (every man, woman, child), you

each get $516,528.

B. Or, if you have one of the 188,251 homes in

New Orleans, your home gets $1,329,787 for repairs.

C. Or, if you are a family of four, your family
gets $2,066,012.

Washington, D.C .. HELLO!!! ... Are all your calculators
broken??

Tax his land,

Tax his wage,

Tax his bed in which he lays.

Tax his tractor,

Tax his mule,

Teach him taxes is the rule.

Tax his cow,

Tax his goat,

Tax his pants,

Tax his coat.

Tax his ties,

Tax his shirts,

Tax his work,

Tax his dirt.

Tax his tobacco,

Tax his drink,

Tax him if he tries to think.

Tax his booze,

Tax his beers,

If he cries,

Tax his tears.

Tax his bills,

Tax his gas,

Tax his notes,

Tax his cash.

Tax him good and let him know

That after taxes, he has no dough.

If he hollers,

Tax him more,

Tax him until he's good and sore.

Tax his coffin,

Tax his grave,

Tax the sod in which he lays.

Put these words upon his tomb,

'Taxes drove me to my doom!'

And when he's gone,

We won't relax,

We'll still be after the inheritance TAX!!

Accounts Receivable Tax

Building Permit Tax

CDL License Tax

Cigarette Tax

Corporate Income Tax

Dog License Tax

Federal Income Tax

Federal Unemployment Tax (FUTA)

Fishing License Tax

Food License Tax

Fuel Permit Tax

Gasoline Tax

Hunting License Tax

Inheritance Tax

Inventory Tax

IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax),

IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax),

Liquor Tax,

Luxury Tax,

Marriage License Tax,

Medicare Tax,

Property Tax,

Real Estate Tax,

Service charge taxes,

Social Security Tax,

Road Usage Tax (Truckers),

Sales Taxes,

Recreational Vehicle Tax,

School Tax,

State Income Tax,

State Unemployment Tax (SUTA),

Telephone Federal Excise Tax,

Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax,

Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Tax,

Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax,

Telephone Recurring and Non-recurring Charges Tax,

Telephone State and Local Tax,

Telephone Usage Charge Tax,

Utility Tax,

Vehicle License Registration Tax,

Vehicle Sales Tax,

Watercraft Registration Tax,

Well Permit Tax,

Workers Compensation Tax.

STILL THINK THIS IS FUNNY?

Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago,

and our nation was the most prosperous in the
world. We had absolutely no national debt, had the largest middle class in the world, and Mom stayed home to raise the kids.

What happened? Can you spell 'politicians!'

And I still have to 'press

1' for English.

I hope this goes around THE USA at least a billion times

***

While your politicians are running around promising you billions of dollars worth of stuff to keep or get themselves elected, please, please keep in mind exactly how much of your hard earned money they are taking from you in old and new taxes.

& now the World had been mesmerized into what would amount to the biggest boondoggle in the history of Earth- $45 trillion needed to combat warming . That's 45,000 times a billion. That's beyond anyone's ability to imagine. It is ~15 times the US budget each year. At some point these amounts are so large that they are no longer money, but power & control of peoples & countries. Like a billionaire that owns 15 skyscrapers & can stand at the top of one of them & point out which ones he owns - but very little else. Or the flea floating down the river with a boner yelling for the drawbridge to be lifted. Remember the UN oil-for-food boondoggle? Imagine what would happen if the amount of money were in the hands of the UN idiots?

& now how much is 700 billion?

The Bottom Line: If the Treasury simply took the $700 Billion and started paying off taxpayer mortgages, they could pay off every mortgage in the country worth less than $75,000... Or put another way, $700 Billion could pay off well over half of all outstanding first mortgages in the entire country.

SOMEBODY IS NOT WATCHING OR READING! WE'RE NOW TALKING TRILLIONS INSTEAD ! Next time let's elect someone who at least took basic economics.

3/11/2009 - Congress at work: '$1 billion an hour'

source...
“In just 50 days, Congress has voted to spend about $1.2 trillion between the Stimulus and the Omnibus,” McConnell says. “To put that in perspective, that’s about $24 billion a day, or about $1 billion an hour"most of it borrowed. There’s simply no question: government spending has spun out of control.”

...

Comments

Mark de LA says

Borrowed from an email from T, thanks

Mark de LA says

And from the Glouster Times comes "trillions & trillions" !

To quote

source: ... A billion here and a billion there and pretty soon you're talking big money.

- Sen. Everett Dirksen

... or to quote Rush

source: ...

Now, these problems have one root, folks: liberal Democrats. Sorry to say it, but it's true! You can trace the massive expansion of entitlements to FDR's New Deal and LBJ's Great Society programs. You can argue about the motives: whether these entitlements were born from good intentions, or whether they were designed to create dependency among large swaths of Americans, ensuring Democrats' eternal power. But you can't argue with the results. Unreformed, they will bankrupt the nation.

And you cannot argue with one more thing. Even now, Democrats are proposing more massive entitlements -- health care, education, and to cripple the private-sector economy over the global warming hoax. And that's why I continue to tell you it's not Iraq, but the vision of the country's future, that's the central issue of next year's presidential election. Make book on it.

...

Mark de LA says

A couple more notes in the size of things & numbers:

4.5 billion years ago the Earth did not exist.
13.73 billion years ago was when Scientists claim the Big Bang happened before which according to them nothing existed. (maybe just taxes)
3,100 billion is what the government budget is ~ for this year.

Seth says

M 2008-04-25 09:35:37 9027

seth 2008-04-25 08:39:51 9027

Do you know how many billion Bush is printing up for his "stimulus" give-away?

It's the Federal Reserve & Congress that panicked at what the M$M was saying about the economy. The president, contrary to what they teach you in school, can't give away any money at all without Congress (specifically the House of Representatives). (I could explain that for those who do not remember high school civics in another topic.) So in accordance with Seth's policies I declare his own comment off-topic & it will self destruct as partisan bullshit shortly. This topic is about money, taxes & the size of government - not partisan bullshit!

FYI, if you had left the word "Bush" out of the comment it might have been acceptable. I opposed the give away, but I will spend it anyway; probably on gasoline.

Well Bush went on TV this morning and took credit for it ... but sure it was a joint effort between Palosi (etc) and Bush. Delete away, i couldnt care less. I'm still curious what the total figure was ... too bad nobody is talking about it.

Mark de LA says

seth 2008-04-25 08:39:51 9027

Do you know how many billion Bush is printing up for his "stimulus" give-away?

FYI, if you had left the word "Bush" out of the comment it might have been acceptable. I opposed the give away, but I will spend it anyway; probably on gasoline.

Mark de LA says

source: ...
Appropriations To Carry Out Rebates- (1) IN GENERAL- Immediately upon the enactment of this Act, the following sums are appropriated, out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2008: (A) DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY- (i) For an additional amount for `Department of the Treasury--Financial Management Service--Salaries and Expenses', $64,175,000, to remain available until September 30, 2009. (ii) For an additional amount for `Department of the Treasury--Internal Revenue Service--Taxpayer Services', $50,720,000, to remain available until September 30, 2009. (iii) For an additional amount for `Department of the Treasury--Internal Revenue Service--Operations Support', $151,415,000, to remain available until September 30, 2009. (B) SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION- For an additional amount for `Social Security Administration--Limitation on Administrative Expenses', $31,000,000, to remain available until September 30, 2008.

... From Wikipedia Economic Stimulus Act of 2008

As all official acts of congress you have to read a lot of fine print to find the obscure earmarks & payoffs to various congressperson's constituents to get the bills passed.

If I added just the above into the mix I get an appropriation of $297,310,000.

See the source & it's bibliography for further details. The way it is written that may only be the amount the government spends just getting the money to you.

Mark de LA says

U.S. Population is ~301,139,947 people . Lets say that for the sake of argument only half of them are eligible then the amount would be $45,170,992,050+ the cost of the giving it away bureaucracy or roughly 46 billion $$.

Seth says
So the cost of the stimulus package is $297,310,000 ... that just a might over a 1/4 b ... just a fraction of a single governmental slug ... just a might bit more than we spend in Iraq every day ... just pocket change.

Denise is getting euphoric about it ... she thinks our customers are going to run out and spend it on speak to me products.

Seth says

M 2008-04-25 10:08:04 9027

Woops looks like you are right, the 1/4 B in the appropriations is just the immediate price of printing the checks ... the real cost is more like 200 B.

Mark de LA says

Well, Congress & the M$M have a funny way of looking at things some days. I look at it as $300 per person that the government doesn't get to spend - good for us! They never look at it that way they always think in terms of raising more taxes rather than spending less. If they don't get as much money as they did in their budget last year it's called "slashing the budget". They even think that if they don't get the rate of increase that they have for the previous years that it's a "slashing of the budget" even though they get more money this year than last. Go figure

Mark de LA says

M 2008-04-25 06:43:29 9027

A couple more notes in the size of things & numbers:

4.5 billion years ago the Earth did not exist.
13.73 billion years ago was when Scientists claim the Big Bang happened before which according to them nothing existed. (maybe just taxes)
3,100 billion is what the government budget is ~ for this year.

Another way of saying the second item above is that the government budget today if spent at the rate of $225 per year going backwards in time would not all be spent before the Universe disappeared! And next year at the rate the budget increases, you could spend a $/day going backwards in time & still have something left when it all goes un-Bang!

Mark de LA says
Overall, the Treasury will distribute more than $110 billion to 130 million taxpayers by July.
http://money.cnn.com/2008/04/25/news/economy/rebate_update/?postversion=2008042514

Mark de LA says

FYI, the federal 2009 budget is somewhere around 3.1 trillion. The population is around 303,331,484 & counting according to this website. That means that we spend the equivalent of 2 gold $5000 limit credit cards each year for every man, woman & child counted in the USA each year. That's just for the parts of the budget which are not hidden. Social Security is off budget. So are a lot of other things. If you think you can untangle it go to http://origin.www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy09/browse.html

P.S. The national debt is ~ 9.5 trillion or 6.1 gold cards with a $5000 limit. That means we are giving the government who already owes ~ 6 gold cards worth of debt for each person in the US - 2 more gold cards each year to play with while they raise the debt ceiling each year because they can't pay it all.

This is

Mark de LA says

Trillion is the new billion.

Mark de LA says

If you would like to visualize a trillion then go to http://www.wallstats.com/blog/flowcapping-visualizing-one-trillion-dollars-video/ or follow the bottom of that page where each poster gives some feature of what a trillion would buy.

C says

... or notice what the Federal Reserve is doing in Friday's Day of Reckoning report on the Federal Debt Commission.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/01/AR2010120106870_pf.html

http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/on-the-record/transcript/sen-gregg-it-now-time-govern-039catastrophic039-national-debt

The Drudge Headlines say a mouthful:

FED SECRETLY BAILED OUT GE -- GE NEWS OUTLETS FAILED TO REVEAL IN FED COVERAGE ...
BOMBSHELL: European banks took big slice of aid...
Hundreds of billions of dollars...
Fed reveals global extent of its backing...
BANK OF AMERICA Becoming 'Bank of Asia' as Revenue Increases 30% ...
MORE SECRETS: Fed Withholds Data for $885 Billion in Loans...

SANTA CLAUSE: FED AID WENT ALL OVER; COMPANIES, BANKS, OFFSHORE

Seth says

Well i'm sure that there is all kinds of excesses and corruption in the banking industry and that it extends into the federal reserve and even into the Congress which collaborates with that industry. The function of banks used to be to take in deposits and loan out that money so that businesses and people could thrive. But in the last several years that has changed, especially for the big banks and financial institutions. Now their primary function is making money for themselves. They speculate with their own money to increase it. In the past the percentage of GDP contributed by the banks was about 10%, but now it has bloated to about 30% or more. But these institutions contribute nothing of real tangible value to the economy. They are just sucking out their profits and contributing scarce little back. One thing that amazed me about this last financial crisis, was that the banks recovered very rapidly and returned to double digit profits ... but they did not loan their money out to the rest of the economy which was hurting and needed credit. That's one of the biggest reasons that the fed's pumping cheep money into the economy didn't get thins moving.

We must find a way to get the financial industry back to sanity!

Billions & billions

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SANTA CLAUSE: FED AID WENT ALL OVER; COMPANIES, BANKS, OFFSHORE

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