Checking the Debt Clock this morning reveals that, as of 07 Aug 2008 at 03:49:22 PM GMT, the outstanding public debt is...
$9,572,825,890,604
The numbers are so mind boggling, so beyond the normal range of experiences for the average person, that they're difficult to comprehend.
Never mind average people. Even Russian oligarchs, Arab petro-princes, American tech tycoons, and Indian steel magnates would have trouble with this bill. If you combine the net worth of the Forbes 100 (as calculated in February 2008) you come up with a total of $1,740,268,000,000.
So if these guys went "all in", they could pay 18.18% of the debt. Or, expressed another way, we'd need them to spend their net worths five and half times in order to get out of the red.
If that somehow seems reasonable, consider the 3-year-average (2003-2005) median household income in the U.S. is $46,037. So, at that rate, we need ~ 208 MILLION household incomes to pay off the debt.
I'm curious about the upcoming documentary I.O.U.S.A. Perhaps it will serve as the equivalent of An Inconvenient Truth in terms of at least raising the profile of the issue and spurring discussion.
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