One Thousand Million

One thousand million is one billion, well at least in America. In Europe one million, millions is a billion. So there are no true “European” billionaires. They all use the American standard. So how do you visualize a billion dollars, or for that matter a billion anything?

• About a billion minutes ago, the Roman Empire was in full swing. (One billion minutes is about 1,900 years.)
  
• About a billion hours ago, we were living in the Stone Age. (One billion hours is about 114,000 years.)
  
• About a billion months ago, dinosaurs walked the earth. (One billion months is about 82 million years.)
  
• A billion inches is 15,783 miles, more than halfway around the earth (circumference).
  
• A billion pennies, stacked one atop the other, would reach nearly 1,000 miles.
• The Space Shuttle orbits about 225 miles above the Earth’s surface.
  
• A person counting at the rate of two numbers per second would need 5 years, 308 days, 9 hours, 41 minutes, 50 seconds to reach a billion.
  
• The earth is about 8,000 miles wide (diameter), and the sun is about 800,000 miles wide, not quite a million.

There are a little more than 2000 billionaires in the world, with about 550 in the States. China has the most billionaires with over 800. The three richest men in the world are Jeff Bezos (137B), Bill Gates (98B) and Warren Buffet( 82B). The average annual salary in the US is around $31,000. It would take you 32 years to save up one billion dollars, and I mean every penny. The chances of you becoming a billionaire are one in 3.5 million. The chances of you being struck by lightening are one in seven hundred thousand. You will meet more people who were struck by lightening than are billionaires. The combined wealth of all the billionaire’s in the world is around $9 trillion. One thousand billions equal one trillion. One trillion minutes ago the ancestor of modern man walked the earth, Homo Erectus, some 1.9 million years in the past. Modern man, Homo Sapiens would come along almost a trillion minutes later, 1.7 million years. One billion minutes from now the date will be March 27, 3918. One trillion minutes from now, add 2 million years.

There are no trillionares, although there is a list of people currently alive who may make it to the unimaginably wealthy status. For instance, Jeff Bezos Amazon stock is currently trading at around $1000 a share. If it goes up to $12,000 a share in his lifetime, it would make him a trillionare. The richest man in human history was Mansa Musa. He was the king of Timbuktu from 1280-1337. Historian describe his wealth as incomprehensible. But you know me.. Im’a try to describe it..

There is a story that tells of the king traveling to Meca for the Muslim pilgrimage of the Hajj. It was said he took dozens of camels that carried hundreds of pounds of gold. Now my research said a camel can carry around 800 lbs. At today’s market rate, a pound of gold is worth $19,107.23. One camel carrying 800 pounds of gold in today’s market would be worth $15,285,784.00 That’s right, 15 and a quarter million dollars. If he had 4 dozen camels on that trip to Hajj, then he took $733,717,632.00 with him. That’s better than three quarters of a billion dollars on a vacation and we all know that was pocket change and since this is a black oriented news blog, I would be amiss not to mention Musa was black. That’s him in the picture above.

Tonight’s Power Ball jackpot, $750 million, is worth more than the “Camels Of Musa.” Remember you heard that phrase here first. Go out, try your luck and have some fun. Our nasty little world is not going to change over night. We will be back at it tomorrow. Good luck!!