How much is $700 billion?

September 25th, 2008 at 08:30am Georgette Braun

By now, we all know that Congress is in the midst of authorizing a $700 billion bailout of struggling financial institutions.

Slate’s Explainer puts that amount in perspective:

There are about 300 million men, women, and children currently living in the United States, so the bailout is equal to roughly $2,300 per person. That’s right around what we each paid, on average, for gas and oil in 2006 ($2,227).

Titanic, one of the highest-grossing movies of all time, raked in $1.8 billion from the worldwide box office, so James Cameron would have to make roughly 381 Titanic-sized blockbusters to settle Wall Street’s debts.

According to the Stern report (issued by U.K. economist Sir Nicholas Stern), global climate change could cost the planet $9 trillion (or 12.86 bailouts) if we don’t address the problem within the next decade or so.

Care to share any other comparisons?

Entry Filed under: economy