A Million, A Billion, What's the Dif?
As of this writing, the cost of the Iraqi War to US taxpayers is approaching $416 Billion. So, what’s the difference between a billion and a million?
Well, imagine that you have a large basket filled with $1 Million in $1000 bills. Each day you take out and spend one of those thousand dollar bills. In a little less than three years your basket would be empty.
Now imagine that you have a larger basket filled with $1 Billion in $1,000 bills. If you began taking out those bills during Jesus’ lifetime (OK, Roman bills back then, but you get the idea), you would still be taking out those bills today – and for the next 732 years.
So $416 Billion sure adds up fast. Now imagine this as borrowed money (not hard to imagine actually, since it is), and our children and grandchildren have to put those $1000 bills back in that basket…
What have we done?
Here is a running tabulation of the cost of the war, along with some tables describing what we might do with that money besides burning it bill by bill.