That's $4,284,500,000,000

[seemslikeadream]

http://www.cnbc.com/id/27719011

Given the speed at which the federal government is throwing money at the financial crisis, the average taxpayer, never mind member of Congress, might not be faulted for losing track.

CNBC, however, has been paying very close attention and keeping a running tally of actual spending as well as the commitments involved.

Try $4.28 trillion dollars. That's $4,284,500,000,000 and more than what was spent on WW II, if adjusted for inflation, based on our computations from a variety of estimates and sources*.


Slideshow
Biggest Budget Items In US History

Not only is it a astronomical amount of money, its' a complicated cocktail of budgeted dollars, actual spending, guarantees, loans, swaps and other market mechanisms by the Federal Reserve, the Treasury and other offices of government taken over roughly the last year, based on government data and news releases. Strictly speaking, not every cent is a direct result of what's called the financial crisis, but it is arguably related to it.

Some 68-percent of the sum falls under the Federal Reserve's umbrella, while another 16 percent is the under the Troubled Asset Relief Program, TARP, as defined under the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act, signed into law in early October

[indepat]

1. The economic, environmental, and war-inflicted devastation inflicted by junior is in the tens

of trillions of dollars, yet 66% of the white folk in my native state voted to stay the course with McSame. Sheer madness, sheer lunacy, those blinded by and eaten up with the right. :P

[JonQ]

2. Sheesh

this is why I couldn't give my support to the bail-out package. I knew this would happen.

[NorCalDem]

6. Yep, you throw money at someone and all it accomlishes...

is that more people come running and asking for money...

[CrispyQ]

3. Big Numbers

If you were to start counting one number per second, night & day, it would take 32,000 years to get to one trillion.




This wonderful little graphic was included with an article by Carl Sagan on the power of exponents in Parade Magazine back in the early 90's. Damn! I miss Carl!

[Javaman]

5. Looks like it was drawn by the guy who draws Mutts. nt

[truedelphi]

9. Ihave been wondering what came after a trillion lately and just how it

Looks.

Your wonderful graphic says it all.

[asjr]

4. While not minding the store Bush

allowed the pharma companies and the banks to rob us blind.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

7. Gee, I wonder who's going to pick up the tab?

[Hydra]

8. Biggest smash and grab in HISTORY

All aided and abetted by people who were too afraid of what MIGHT have happened had the people risen up in 2000 when the Supreme Court violated the laws of the land.

"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

Benjamin Franklin

[truedelphi]

10. I am so amazed at the complacency most people have about this situation

Paulson, who assured us just last July that our markets and banking system were as steady and stable as a rock, is now making sure that our Treasury is worth about as much as a clump of rocks.

While almost everyone, including Obama, pretends that Paulson ain't the biggest thief in history!

[Hydra]

11. I told people that I was gonna shut up

And for the most part, I am. I'm still doing this though:

:popcorn:

And I can't help but smirk. We have the gov't we deserve.