BILLION: Press earns nine zeroes

As a longtime subscriber to the Coeur d'Alene Press, I have been pleased with the improvement in recent months of your staff's use of correct grammar and spelling. However, I was very disappointed after reading today's editorial (Borrowing From Disaster, April 3). Apparently, this accuracy does not extend to your use of simple numbers.

Since when does the number for 1 billion contain 12 zeroes? The last time I checked, 1 billion contained only 9 zeroes! Vice-President Joe Biden was recently quoted as calling the number 1,000,000,000 as "One Trillion." However, I thought that your proofreaders were smarter than the V.P.!

Perhaps you were just testing your readers, to see if we are actually reading your editorials? Or, maybe, this is just a belated "April Fuhl's Joke?"

D.J. FRASER

Coeur d'Alene

Editor's note: The joke's on us. One billion is 1 followed by nine zeroes.