NATIONAL DEBT: 315,000 tons of pain

I would like to put some perspective on the nature of spending trillions of dollars. A trillion is a million million, which is written as a one followed by 12 zeros. A million dollars in $100 bills weighs about 21 pounds. Therefore, a trillion of these little gems would weigh in at around 21 million pounds or 10,500 tons.

Can you imagine one trillion dollars sitting in any one place? By the end of this year our national debt is expected to be $30 trillion, which would tip some gigantic scale at 315,000 tons. The Queen Mary of the 1930s around a thousand feet long was designed to displace 81,000 tons. That means our national debt is almost equal to the weight of four Queen Marys (324,000 tons).

We’ve all heard the familiar refrain, how our spending will put burdens on our children and grandchildren. But that has been going on for decades. We are still spending outrageously beyond our means, and now more than ever. Maybe we will stop printing money when we run out of paper, which shouldn’t take too long the way things are going.

FRANK MILLER

Post Falls