BIGGER THAN A BREAD BOX

In trying to comprehend the budget deficits that our government is proposing, we face the problem of what academics call “insensitivity to scope.” It affects us all; we can understand something on a small scale but have a difficult time comprehending the same thing on a massive scale.

Insensitivity to scope is a major obstacle to understanding budget deficits running to the trillions over the next decade. One way I've read to explain what a trillion is is to make it accessible, say by thinking of one dollar as one second of time. That may make it easier to comprehend the debt we are about to incur.

So here goes. If a dollar is one second in time:

1. Who was President one million seconds ago? Don't calculate it . . . take 5 seconds to answer.
2. Who was President one billion seconds ago?
3. Who was President one trillion seconds ago?

ANSWERS:

1) Approximately one million seconds ago (about 11 days ago), Barak Obama was President and was celebrating with just finishing up his first 100 days. Arlen Spector announced his intention to leave the Republican Party and join the Democratic Party; the 2009 NBA playoffs were in the full gear; Joe Biden was warning against taking the subway.

2) Approximately one billion seconds ago (1977-78), Jimmy Carter was President; Anwar Sadat visited Israel; the Sex Pistols were hot; Bruce Jenner was a leading celebrity; John Belushi was on Saturday Night Live; Ayatollah Khomeini returned to Iran; Barak Obama was in high school and Teddy Kennedy was divorcing his first wife.

3) Approximately one trillion seconds ago (30,000 b.c.), no one was President. Neanderthals camped in Europe; the Great Lakes had yet to be formed; the world's few homo sapiens had barely emerged from Africa; woolly mamoths, sabertooth tigers and giant sloths roamed much of the world unmolested by humanoids.

That is how big a trillion is.