a billion

[GodPossessed]

Saw this in an email. Thought it was kindof funny, but true...I apologize if you have already seen it.



"What is a Billion
This is too true to be 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
the Stone Age.

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.

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

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

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.

What the heck happened?????"

100 years ago, women were not allowed to vote and uppity negroes knew their place, too...

[GodPossessed]

those were the days - sigh

[Watser?]

I don't mean to be uppity, it's not my money after all, but if it were I wouldn't mind money being spent on the rebuilding of New Orleans, even if it is a few billion, but I would definitely mind the billions that are spent in a pointless war in Iraq every month.

[Naru]

Originally Posted by GodPossessed

Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago, and
our nation was the most prosperous in the world.

Is this true? I was under the impression that the US wasn't really all that influential until WWI or so. Any history people want to chime in?

Originally Posted by Naruto

Is this true? I was under the impression that the US wasn't really all that influential until WWI or so. Any history people want to chime in?

Our influence was fairly modest until after World War II, to the best of my knowledge.

[Watser?]

Originally Posted by Naruto

Is this true? I was under the impression that the US wasn't really all that influential until WWI or so. Any history people want to chime in?

I have here from The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers by Paul Kennedy, Relative shares of world manufacturing output 1880 (percent)
Britain 22.9
US 14.7
Germany 8.5
France 7.8

1900
Britain 18.5
US 23.6
Germany 13.2
France 6.8

1913
Britain 13.6
US 32.0
Germany 14.8
France 6.1

[Leesifer]

Originally Posted by Watser?

I have here from The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers by Paul Kennedy, Relative shares of world manufacturing output 1880 (percent)
Britain 22.9
US 14.7
Germany 8.5
France 7.8

1900
Britain 18.5
US 23.6
Germany 13.2
France 6.8

1913
Britain 13.6
US 32.0
Germany 14.8
France 6.1

[Watser?]

Originally Posted by Leesifer

[wei yau]

Originally Posted by Leesifer

What are you on about Frenchie? France never got out of last place!

[Naru]

Originally Posted by Leesifer

American Revolutionary War - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[California Tanker]

Originally Posted by Leesifer

Damned if I know why you did that, the figures clearly show the US stomping ahead over time.

I think the US's international weight was less than this would imply, however, as it would have taken up a stupid amount of manufacturing ability just to keep the country running: Look at how many miles of railroad needed to be built and run in 1913 vs in the UK, for example. The Global Economy of today wasn't there, all that produce has to get across the water somehow, whilst the UK's exports just needed to get across the Channel. Militarily also, the US was insignificant until mid WWII, barring the Navy.

NTM

[wildernesse]

I've seen this message in the OP in email before and it always makes me extremely annoyed. Maybe its the part about Mom staying home with the kids, which was not really ever the case in my family. Why? Because, like most Americans, my family was poor. You can find them working in the cotton mills--mama, daddy, and all their children over age six--from the time cotton mills sprang up near them, which in their case was 1848. My mother is the first generation in her family who never worked in the mill.

Those who weren't lintheads lived on the farm and everyone stayed at home with the kids. There wasn't any place to go--except for school and church.

I love mythical America of times past. Back when everyone spoke English. Unless you were in a large city. Or in California. Or Texas. Etc.

[Watser?]

Originally Posted by California Tanker

Damned if I know why you did that, the figures clearly show the US stomping ahead over time.

I think the US's international weight was less than this would imply, however, as it would have taken up a stupid amount of manufacturing ability just to keep the country running: Look at how many miles of railroad needed to be built and run in 1913 vs in the UK, for example. The Global Economy of today wasn't there, all that produce has to get across the water somehow, whilst the UK's exports just needed to get across the Channel. Militarily also, the US was insignificant until mid WWII, barring the Navy.

NTM

Actually, Kennedy points out that the economy was more globally integrated in the early 20th century than at any point after WWI. Until maybe the 1990s.
You are right about the military spending. There are other statistics in there that make that clear. The US did not grow up to be a military superpower until somewhere during WWII. It didn't live up to its economic potential either until somewhere in the 1940s I think.

[godfry n. glad]

Originally Posted by Naruto

Is this true? I was under the impression that the US wasn't really all that influential until WWI or so. Any history people want to chime in?

Others have taken this and run with it.

I want to back up and ask, does "prosperous" necessarily equate to "influential"?

I'd like to know what was meant by "prosperous". In 1908, there weren't that many "prosperous" nations in the world at all, using industrialized western measures. Compared to some other parts of the world, the US was quite "prosperous"...but, I'm not sure that the claim can be made that it was "the most prosperous", but "one of the most prosperous" isn't that big of a claim.

The use of the term "influential" seems to me to vary with the user, as well. Able to kick the shit out of any other nation which gets in it's way....No. Able to tool up to produce massive amounts of industrial products and the organization to move it where it was needed, as the underpinning for a protracted conflict, there was none better (at the time). I'd say that the US international political influence began when the bully imperialist US kicked the crap out of tired, old Spain and took away most of it's colonies. Economic influence probably came before that...during the building of the trans-continental railroads, when European interests invested heavily in the growing US industrial infrastructure, and the primary industrial fuel shifted from coal to petroleum.

[Dingfod]

Life was great 100 years ago in America. Men put in 14-16 hours of heavy labor a day, six days a week, for about a dollar a day, if you were lucky enough to have a job at the foundry/factory/mine/smelter/mill. It was common for women and children to work in sweatshop conditions as well, anything to get by. Only a small percentage of homes had electricity, telephones, or flush toilets. Coal and wood smoke in the air practically choked the life out of you. Human waste and horse manure littered the streets. Women only washed their hair once a month, and most people rarely bathed more than once weekly. Outside of cities there were few paved roads. A car was only a dream for most people. The leading causes of death were pneumonia and influenza, but only about 10% of physicians had much in the way formal education; life expectancy was only about 45 or 50.

On the other hand, marijuana, heroin, and morphine were all available at corner drugstores without a prescription. That might have made it barely tolerable.

[Leesifer]

[The Lone Ranger]

I kind of enjoy doing exercises like this, to try to grasp the immensity of Geological Time. I note, however, that there are a number of miscalculations and inaccuracies in the OP. (Not GodPossessed's fault, I'm sure.)


Hopefully, I did my math correctly. If we take a year as having 365.25 days (this accounts for leap years), then there are 24 x 365.25 hours = 8,766 hours per year. 8,766 hours x 60 minutes/hour = 525,960 minutes per year. 525,960 minutes x 60 seconds/minute = 31,557,600 seconds per year, give or take a second or two.


That means 1 billion seconds = 31.69 years. So, 1 billion seconds ago was sometime in the year 1976. Make of that what you will.

One billion minutes = 1,901.3 years. So, 1 billion minutes ago would be around the year 106 or 107 C.E. Assuming Jesus Christ ever existed, this was decades after his supposed death.

One billion hours = 114,077 years. So, 1 billion hours takes us back to the Ice Ages, well before the invention of agriculture and well before our ancestors first began to use metals. So this was, in fact, the late Paleolithic ("Stone Age").

One billion days = 2,737,850 years. Homo sapiens had yet to evolve, though there were members of the genus Homo extant at that time. Hominids had, in fact, been walking upright ("on two feet") for some 2 million years or more by this time.

One billion weeks = 19,164,955 years. At that point, early apes had evolved, but nothing remotely resembling modern humans existed.

One billion months = 83,333,333 years (approximately). This was during the Cretaceous, when dinosaurs dominated the planet -- about 15 million years before Tyrannosaurus rex lived.

One billion years ago, nothing lived on the land. There were no plants, and probably no animals either. It's possible that some very simple animals (comparable to jellyfish) had evolved by this point and were living in the seas, but we have no fossils of any animals within 100,000,000 years of this time.

One billion decades ago, neither the Earth nor the Sun yet existed. The Universe itself had only fairly recently come into existence.


FWIW.

Cheers,

Michael

[Ensign Steve]

Originally Posted by The Lone Ranger

That means 1 billion seconds = 31.69 years. So, 1 billion seconds ago was sometime in the year 1976. Make of that what you will.

I'm nearly one billion seconds old?!

Originally Posted by Ensign Steve

I'm nearly one billion seconds old?!

[lisarea]

Originally Posted by Ensign Steve

I'm nearly one billion seconds old?!

You can find your Gigasecond Birthday here.

My brother made us give him a party for his. Seriously.

[Leesifer]

lacist!

[ChuckF]

Wow, no telephone taxes and vehicle registration taxes 100 years ago. And no Medicare or utility taxes either. Sounds like a paradise.

Now let's get to work abolishing those dog license taxes and restoring American greatness.

[The Lone Ranger]

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

Oh, the irony!

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.

Actually, not to nitpick or anything, but $250,000,000,000 divided by 484,674 = $515,810.6.

B. Or, if you have one of the 188,251 homes in New Orleans , your home gets $1,329,787.

Actually, $250,000,000,000 divided by 188,251 = $1,328,014.


Somehow, I find it amusing when someone complains about politicians being unable to do basic math -- then gets most of the math wrong. Maybe that's just me, though.

Cheers,

Michael

[Dingfod]

Goddam ur old.