If you say it quickly enough, a billion seems to be little more than a million. However, a billion is a thousand times more than a million.
If you look at the image where each dot is 50 000, you can appreciate the size of a billion and the magnitude of the amounts looted.
This representation is always a good grounding. Another way to imagine the sheer lunacy of the numbers is as follows:
If it took you 2 years to make 10 million, and you have billionaire ambitions, speak to a career counselor. You’d need another 200 years to get there at the same rate.
It depends…
USA billion is VERY SMALL - only 1,000 million. (So they can boast much sooner.)
The real world (UK-based) - 1,000,000 million (a million million).
Now do the maths with REAL numbers.
In 1974 the UK officially changed to the short scale definition. Nine zeros.
