WHAT IS A TRILLION, REALLY?

What is a Trillion, anyway?

Baby Boomers have often proclaimed “50 is the new 40.”

According a recent CNN report, “Trillion is the new billion.”

With all the talk about stimulus funding, deficits and the budget, the numbers lack context. It is hard for us to understand a billion, let alone a trillion.

To start with, let’s start with dollars we can understand. Let’s say I settled a large injury case that netted you $100,000.00. That is clearly One Hundred Thousand dollars.

Ten times that is One Thousand Thousands, or what we call One Million Dollars.

Now, it takes One Thousand Million to make a Billion. That is a one followed by nine zeros.

And a Trillion is a Thousand Billion. Feeling numb yet?

You see, a Trillion dollars is the number 1 followed by 12 zeroes!

One trillion $1 bills stacked one on top of the other would reach nearly 68,000 miles into the sky, or about a third of the way from the Earth to the moon!

A million seconds is about 11½ days. A billion seconds is about 32 years, and a trillion seconds is 32,000 years!

That means that a billion minutes ago, Jesus had just risen from the dead!

To put a trillion dollars in context, if you spend a million dollars every day since Jesus was born, you still wouldn't have spent a trillion!

I sometimes wonder if our elected officials actually understand these numbers.

*Mr. Peel, a Christian Injury Lawyer, may be available to speak to your church or community group. He may be reached through www.PeelLawFirm.com. Other articles maybe found on his blog at www.DavidBPeel.blogspot.com

BOOMERS HAVE REGRETS

BABY BOOMERS HAVE SOME REGRETS

A recent article by Rebecca D'Angelo in USA TODAY found that there are some common regrets among those born between 1946 and 1964.

This is what they wished they had known earlier:

•The stock market can go down as well as up.

•Your home equity line should not be used as a personal ATM.

•Youth doesn't last forever, but moving more, and eating less can delay old age. Comments like, "Why didn't I start with the sunscreen sooner so I wouldn't be so wrinkled?” as well as consternation over bulging waistlines, weight-related illness or ailments, and decreased physical capabilities are common.

•Our parents weren't blowing smoke when they said "Live within your means" and "Save for a rainy day." Now "they're afraid they'll outlive their money" because they didn't plan and save enough and certainly didn't predict the economy's meltdown.

In general their comments might be summarized as: “A little less ice cream and a lot more saving.”

If they live another 30 or 40 years, they will find longevity brings challenges. Some folks are realizing that 35 years of work cannot easily support 35 years of retirement.

It is not as if Baby Boomers did not have great role models. The generation that fought World War 2 has often been called the “Greatest Generation.” I am sure that the Depression era that preceded World War 2 did more good than harm to the character of Americans. It seems that the further we have gotten from those awful financial times, the more spoiled and selfish we have become.

Is there anyone now who will rise up and claim that Generation X, Generation Y or whatever we have now, will be the greatest generation? I certainly can’t imagine it.

But, the folks in the mid 1920’s never thought they would see a full out stock market crash in 1929, ushering in the worse Depression in American History. It is fairly well accepted that there were five causes or aggravations of the Great Depression.

1. Stock Market Crash of 1929: One of the major causes that led to the Great Depression.

2. Runs on Bank as Banks Failed: Over 9,000 banks failed and deposits were uninsured, so the money was just gone. You can recall a run on the banks in the classic Christmas movie, “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

3. Spending and Jobs Dried Up: Lack of money and fear kept many from purchasing items, which led to a reduction in the workforce. Foreclosures and repossessions followed. The unemployment rate rose above 25%, and that was likely not even accurate due to the conditions of that day. In many places it was much higher. My Granddaddy used to say, “There just wasn’t no money back then.”

4. American Economic Policy: Desperate for anything that would help, the government tried the Smoot-Hawley Tariff in 1930 to help protect American companies by charging high tariffs on imports. Trade stagnated further.

5. Dustbowl: The Mississippi Valley’s epic drought in 1930 caused many to have sell their farms. This was the topic of John Steinbeck's “The Grapes of Wrath.”

Today, we may be looking at similar conditions. Rising unemployment, stifled spending, a lack of production, foreclosures, less credit availability, rising food and gas prices and a staggering and growing national debt. If a natural disaster, a terrorism cyber attack or other unforeseen tragedy occurs, that may be all it takes to begin building a couple of truly great generations.

Mr. Peel may be available to address your civic club or church, please contact his office at www.PeelLawFirm.com

Money

Money

There are a lot of myths of about money. The one most repeated is that “money is the root of all evil.” However, that is incorrect.

The verse actually says it is love of money that is the problem:

“For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” 1 Timothy 6:9-11 (NIV)

All evil comes from the heart, and not from inanimate objects made of paper or metal. Thus, money is neither moral nor immoral. It can be used for evil or for good. Much like guns, they do nothing on their own, but can be a tool used for an evil thing like murder or the noble defense of victims.

However, there are some facts about money that I found interesting:

-Pennies now contain 97.5 percent zinc and only 2.5 percent copper. However it costs more than penny to make them: it costs 1.8 cents to make a one-cent coin! (With thinking like that, it is no wonder our government is broke!)

-According to the U.S. national debt clock, we stand today at $14,200,727,372,615.35. The estimated population of the United States is 310,175,903, so each citizen's share of this debt is $45,782.82!

-The National Debt has continued to increase an average of $4.12 billion per day since September 28, 2007! To help visualize this, for just one day’s $4.12 billion you could buy a 2012 Ford Mustang for each of your 186,000 closest friends!

-Your odds of winning huge in the a Powerball are something like 1 in 120,526,770, which means you have a better chance of being in a car accident on the way to buy the ticket than to win!

-If you have a $3,000 credit card balance and you pay the minimums you will pay for over 10 years and almost double the repayment.

-A million is a thousand thousands. A billion is a thousand millions. A trillion is a thousand billions.

-How much does $1 million weigh? Since there are 490 notes in a pound, if you used $1 bills it would weigh a staggering 2,040.8 pounds, but if you used $100 bills it would weigh only 20.4 pounds.

-If you had 10 billion $1 notes and spent one every second of every day, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, it would require 317 years for you to go broke.

-“Being well off” is usually defined as those that make about 20%-30% a year more than you. In other words, if you make $25,000 a year, the guy making $32,500 looks pretty well off. But the same is true for the one who makes a million and who looks at the neighbor making 1.3 million.

-Ecclesiastes 5:10 (NIV) summarizes this: “Whoever loves money never has enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with their income. This too is meaningless.”

*Mr. Peel, a Christian Injury Lawyer, may be available to speak to your church or community group. He may be reached through www.PeelLawFirm.com. Other articles maybe found on his blog at www.DavidBPeel.blogspot.com

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The Five Promises

The Five Promises

Someone has said, “We are the product of the five promises we make ourselves early in life.”

It is an interesting concept. In looking at this idea, the first thing you might notice is that your promises and others will rarely be identical.

For instance, a boy who grew up scraping by financially may resolve that when he is older he “will never be without money.”

Or a girl who is sadly abused by those she trusted, might promise herself that she “will never again be hurt by a man,” or “she would die before she let her children be abused.” Many folks repeat these promises out loud as if they are a mantra.

Possibly, a son that moves so much he is in eight schools in twelve years may promise himself “when I am older, I will not move around like this, and I will put down some roots.”

Another trait you might recognize is that these promises affect others. Take the boy who grows up covenanting within himself to always have plenty of money. This might lead him to work hard and invest money. Conversely, it could also lead to life of embezzlement and other crimes. Unfortunately, many folks have made promises to themselves after seeing hypocrisy in the church. Maybe they said they “never be a member of a church again.” This affects their children who, by default, will not be raised in a church at all.

The timing of the promises can vary as well. Some of the promises that affect our lives also happen much later in life. For instance, when a salesman has the door slammed in his face one too many times, he may decide to go get a degree such that clients will come to him. Certainly, in the practice of law, students will often clerk for lawyers who work in an area of law that they find unpalatable. That student may promise himself that he will never practice that type of law when he is licensed.

It has been said that, if you want to change, you have to change one of your earlier promises to yourself. There may be truth in that. However, what changed me was a real encounter with the Living God, who became a man. His name is Jesus. He is still in the life-changing business. If you are at the end of your rope, let go. Seek Him.