What's a billion dollars, anyway? What can you buy with it? It's not an amount of money the average person deals with every day. But it is in the news every day, so I decided to start keeping track of the billion in the news, to give myself a more intuitive idea of just what a billion dollars is worth.

Got a story to add? Email me, <jason@gaydeceiver.com>. (Please, no values over about a quarter-trillion or so.)


$0.095 billion Research contract to develop the OICW. Beyond 2000 8/2000

$0.172 billion Budget for Kevin Costner flop Waterworld. CNN Showbiz 7/26/1995

$0.2 billion Boeing 747-400 aircraft. Boeing

$0.6 billion Box office of top grossing movie, Titanic. Yahoo! Movies 1/30/2001

$0.742 billion Trans World Airlines CNNfn 3/12/2001

$0.75 billion To develop the Gilette Mach 3 razor. Strategy & Business 2nd Quarter, 1999

$1 billion One month of war in Afghanistan. Salon.com 11/12/2001

$1.4 billion Disney's California Adventure theme park. The Weekly Standard 12/10/2001

$1.43 billion Wal-Mart sales on Black Friday, 2002. Yahoo 12/2/2002

$2 billion One Virginia-class attack submarine. Cato.org 2/13/2001

$2 billion Six years of NASCAR TV rights. Salon 2/20/2001

$2.78 billion U.S. aid to Israel. FreeRepublic.com 10/27/2000

$3.5 billion Safe haven in Libya. The Observer 11/17/2002

$5 billion Iridium satellite system. Globe & Mail 3/9/2001

$8 billion Expected revenues from Hong Kong tourism in 2001. CNN 2/19/2001

$8.7 billion Nike products sold in 1998 Global Exchange

$8.9 billion Annual cost of spam to U.S. businesses AP 1/3/2003

$18 billion US food stamp program UPI 1/30/2003

$20 billion Bonds issued by California to buy power. MSNBC 2/11/2001

$20.1 billion Congressional pork. Washington Times 4/9/2002

$24 billion Four hundred and sixty radio stations. Salon 4/30/2001

$30 billion Milk sold in the U.S. per year. Motley Fool 1/12/2001

$30 billion HUD budget per year. MSNBC 12/11/2002

$35 billion America's largest cash crop. LA Times 12/18/2006

$40 billion Christmas presents purchased in the U.S. per year. The Economist 12/20/2001

$42 billion Value of Microsoft stock owned by Bill Gates. Bill Gates Net Worth Page 3/9/2001

$95 billion Budget of the Apollo program. (1990 dollars.) NASA

$157 billion The 1989 Savings & Loan bailout. Take the Rich Off Welfare 1996

$238 billion Bush's proposed yearly budget for Medicare. CNN 2/27/2001
Copyright © 2001 Jason Steiner