Andy Weighs In On The National Debt

Andy Rooney On Millions, Billions And Trillions

(CBS)  The following is a weekly 60 Minutes commentary by CBS News correspondent Andy Rooney.

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You'd probably be surprised to hear me say there are quite a few things I don't know anything about, but you can't worry about everything you don't know because no on else seems to know much about those things either.

I saw a story in the paper that said our national debt is now over $11 trillion. I also know this because the other day I walked past The National Debt Clock they have off Sixth Avenue here in New York. They have to put up a new clock pretty soon so that it will register a quadrillion dollars.

One of the things I don't know is how much a trillion dollars is and I know a quadrillion is a lot more than that. My dictionary says: "The cardinal number that is equal to 10 to the 12th power."

Does that help you understand how much a trillion dollars is? I don't think the dictionary knows how much it is either. What's a "cardinal number" anyway? How many cheeseburgers could I buy with a cardinal number? Give me something specific that I could understand.

A trillion dollars is 1,000 billion. A billion is 1000 million. The Bureau of Engraving and Printing says it comes up with $700 million in paper money every day. About half of that is in one dollar bills.

It also said the average dollar bill lasts two years. The average $100 bill lasts almost seven and a half years, I don't know about that. I know a hundred dollars doesn't last me seven years.

They say people don't like $100 bills because they're apt to confuse them with dollar bills in their pocket. Now who would say a thing like that? I mean if I have a $100 bill in my pocket, I'm not about to confuse it with a one dollar bill or with a note listing what groceries I should buy, either.

It's a good feeling to have some change in your pocket. Something to jingle. I don't care much for fifty cent pieces but you don't run into them anymore anyway. Silver dollars are just for the coin collectors now.

If politicians had to use silver dollars to pay off our national debt, maybe we wouldn't have one.

[darknessesedge]

it will be about 20 trill by the time the current admin is done.

[sjc_1]

Clinton ran $100 billion dollar surpluses the last 3 years of his second term and we were on track to pay down the debt. The Republicans were scrambling to find a way to give that surplus to the rich and the heck with the debt. Now the $5000 billion in debt that Bush racked up needs to be paid down in an economic depression. So much for the tax breaks for the rich trickle down con job.

[noloyalisti]

Yes, and the hypocrite Republicans are pretending they are fiscally responsible. None of them actually were backing Bush. They really were not for spending the country into ruin.

[sjc_1]

Once Reagan figured out that the Social Security Trust Fund could only be invested in Government Treasury Bonds, he spent like crazy on the Pentagon. A one trillion dollar debt became 3 trillion under Reagan and then 4 trillion under Bush Sr. and then 10 trillion under Bush Jr. There is no end to Republican Borrow and Waste when they can spend like mad and not raise taxes.

[campagna777]

hello.....edward..campagna.......viewer.....and..author......who..has..a..book..on..our...debt..was..pleased..to..see....your....special..news......show****..thank.. you**...we...as..americans....must..realize.......this..is..real<<.......very...real<<........and....i..hope....your...show..will..help..my..literary..agent....and..book..company.....to..please...get..my..book..published....after....waiting...4..years..already<<....AND.......i..need..all..the..help..i..can..get..please****thank.. you**...AND....i..need..some..income..also<<<.....sad<<....and....if....i...said....my..literary..agent.....needs..a..slight..push***...maybe..please***...Thank.. you**...and..you..can..mention....tracey@...adamsliterary.com.....And.....my..book..company**...is..harper..collins.........thank.. you***....AND......as..Americans.....thank..you......And...thank..60..minutes..also****...Thank you****4/7/2009....******

[marklloret]

If we lived in England, a Trillion would be a Billion. A Billion would have been a thousand million. The same way a third floor would have been a second floor, and so on.

[brizzz111]

Andy

Here's another way to think about a trillion dollars. Imagine a stack of nice, new $1000 bills. They are flat, crisp, have a lovely picture of Grover Cleveland on them, and most importantly, they stack well.

A stack of these $1000 bills six inches high would contain about 1000 bills, or a total value of about $1 million. If the stack were 500 feet high, which I imagine is about the height of the Washington Monument, the value of all the bills in the stack would be about $1 billion.

But to represent a TRILLION dollars, this stack of crisp $1000 bills would have to be 95 miles high!! This is about 10 times as high as the highest-flying commercial aircraft.

Does this help put it in perspecrtive?

[intheusa]

Posted by TKJohnson1948 at 8:12 AM : Apr 6, 2009 that the debt was 8 trillion when George W Bush left office.

Thats not accurate the debt reported by the treasury was closer to $10.5+ trillion when Bush left office, other wise very good post TKJohnson.

http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/BPDLogin?application=np

[gold_standard]

If gold were the currency of the realm, at least our savings would be worth something. The pieces of paper the government prints more and more of are not worth anything.

The government and the banks tell you that a gold standard is foolish. But they hate gold only because they can't print gold. Gold cannot be counterfeited--by the government or anybody else!

[rushlimpdrug]

Andy,
Pleeeze do us ALL a favor and retire.

Talking stupid on the television is not in your
best interest.

[TKJohnson1948]

Once again, I am surprised and disappointed by a well-known journalist's feeble attempts at clarifying the meaning of large numbers in the context of U.S. finances. Rather than claiming mystification by "ten to the 12th", or further confusing the public (as some pundits do) with "a stack of dollar bills that would reach from here to (insert name of astronomical object)" I would hope that some pundit would simplify this topic along the following lines:

There are about 301 million people in the U.S. Simple arithmetic show us that one trillion (1 followed by 12 zeros) divided by 301 million (301 followed by 6 zeros gives us $ 3,322.26 per person. Budget numbers often contain figures in billions ( 1 followed by 9 zeros) which I readily think of as about $ 3.32 per person. For a traditional nuclear family of 4, just multiply by 4 to get an idea of what the numbers mean for such a family.

If we had a national debt of 10 trillion dollars, we would owe about $ 33,222.60 on behalf of every person in the U.S.

On a related topic: the national debt was about 1 trillion when Reagan took office in 1981. By the end of George W. Bush's presidency, the debt had grown to more than 8 trillion. One way to look at this growth is that it doubled 3 times ( 2, 4, 8 trillion) in just over 27 years. This means that the average doubling time was about 9 years ( 27 divided by 3). The "rule of 72" tells us that the debt was growing at an annual compounded rate of about 8 percent. And note that the growth was mostly during Republican administrations.

[Usana_tom]

Since one trillion seconds is approximately 32,000 years, if we were paying off our debt at $11 per second it would take 32,000 years to pay it off! But, of course, we're not paying it off at all, we're adding to it. Increasing the national debt by just $1 trillion in one year means we're spending about $33,000 per second more than we're generating in revenue.

[perceptions5]

Yeah and Obama is going to add another $10 TRILLION IN DEBT

..........We are now entering the era of "Responsibility" according to our young start celebrity Teleprompter President........

YEP............Change We Can Believe In.................(insert eye roll)

[susanlundgren12]

We all know there are 60 seconds in a minute and 60 minutes in an hour and 24 hours in a day. This simple math helps the mind to comprehend the magnitude between million, billion & trillion:
1 million seconds = 11.57 days
1 billion seconds = 32.7 years
1 trillion seconds = 32,000 years

[MissASU75]

Andy, I simply want to give a quick math lesson, I am a Biology teacher! 10 to the twelth power, written is simply 1 with 12 zeros, 1,000,000,000,000. More examples would be 10 to the 1st power is 1 with 1 zero,10...10 to the 2nd is 1 with 2 zeros, 100...10 to the 3rd is 1000 and so on. I have the most fasinating mathematics e-mail, your audience would love it and I bet you would, too!...allow me to send it to you. I just wrote Oprah last week asking her to let me have a"Teaching Show "for Math, Chemistry,Physics, Biology, English and Spanish1. There are little shortcuts in all of these subjects to make them really, basically easy...truly. You could never imagine the correlation between this kind of basic knowledge and confidence. Thanks for the opportunity

[berryconnell]

Mr. Rooney, I have been a long time fan of yours...(well, let's not talk about how long, though, eh?) and i found it almost odd that you didn't have an idea of how much a trillion dollars is.
Well, it's a lot of money.
(sorry...I couldn't help it)
nyway, having been a long time fan of yours, sometimes I find myself hearing your voice when I write stuff. Oh, nothing scary.
well, OK, I DO rant on occasion, but, don't we all?
I could write my entire answer here, but, the folks at 60 Minutes might not like the length.
I wrote a 'thing' for Humor Times (no-pay, what the hey...) and it might help in explaining how much money that is.
Of course, you might get mad, too.
Oh well. I will still remain a fan of yours even if you send the 'bully squad' after me.
(that's what I used to call the guys, and Leslie, too....hey. Tose guys are tough!)
Well, here it is: http://www.humortimes.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=76
I call it, Economics, relatively speaking.

Well, keep up the good work. And, if you feel like you need a break sometime in the future? I hear Bill Giest has some tricks that can help.

To get a feel for how much a trillion is determine the number of seconds in a day. Then calculate the number of days equal to a million seconds, the number of days and years equal to a billion seconds, and then the number of days and years equal to 1 trillion seconds. Then to get an idea of 11 trillion, multiply the number of years equal to a trillion seconds by 11.

The answers are understandable.

[Andy-U-Da-Man]

Andy,
Excellent commentary on the national debt ... in fact, It might be even a little easier for everyone if you ask the question, "If you wanted to live as long as possible, would you want to live 200 years or 1 trillion seconds? Most will be surprised to learn that 1 trillion seconds is equal to more than 31,000 years (31,688)! Astounding, huh? Scary, too, if our gross national debt is nearly $11 trillion and climbing!
Best regards,
CJF

[tcsinoid]

I hope the pictures come attached,,, Some boby smarter than me has no doubt all ready sent this e-mail to Andy,, But I'll give it a try

Subject: What does a TRILLION DOLLARS look like???



This may be a rerun for some, but it's so impressive, it should be viewed often.

It's the legacy we're leaving our grandchildren! And Great grandchildren!!







What does one TRILLION dollars look like?

All this talk about "stimulus packages" and "bailouts"...

A billion dollars...

A hundred billion dollars...

Eight hundred billion dollars...

One TRILLION dollars...

What does that look like? I mean, these various numbers are tossed around like so many doggie treats, so I thought I'd try to get a sense of what exactly a trillion dollars looks like.

We'll start with a $100 dollar bill. Currently the largest U.S. denomination in general circulation. Most everyone has seen them, slighty fewer have owned them. Guaranteed to make friends wherever they go.



A packet of one hundred $100 bills is less than 1/2" thick and contains $10,000. Fits in your pocket easily and is more than enough for week or two of shamefully decadent fun.



Believe it or not, this next little pile is $1 million dollars (100 packets of $10,000). You could stuff that into a grocery bag and walk around with it.



While a measly $1 million looked a little unimpressive, $100 million is a little more respectable. It fits neatly on a standard pallet...



And $1 BILLION dollars... now we're really getting somewhere...



Next we'll look at ONE TRILLION dollars. This is that number we've been hearing so much about. What is a trillion dollars? Well, it's a million million. It's a thousand billion. It's a one followed by 12 zeros.

You ready for this?

It's pretty surprising.

Go ahead...

Scroll down...

Ladies and gentlemen... I give you $1 trillion dollars...



(And notice the fellow at the lower left corner - and that those pallets are double stacked.)

So the next time you hear someone toss around the phrase "trillion dollars"... that's what they're talking about.


I'll take just one stack...