Post by earl on Oct 10, 2008 10:11:10 GMT
No it's not an onion article!
National Debt Clock runs out of zeroes – new larger clock ordered
When real estate developer Seymour Durst installed an electronic screen in Time Square in 1989 to show the size of the US national debt, he hoped that the glare of public attention might force Washington to cut the deficit. So were he still with us, he'd be unimpressed to learn that National Debt Clock has now run out of room.
The ballooning US national debt has now broken through the $10 trillion mark to reach $10,299.299,050,383 at the time of typing. President Bush must be very proud.
Perhaps understandably, Durst though that thirteen digits would be sufficient to record the debt (which was a mere $2.7tn in the days of Reagonomics), plus one digit for the dollar sign.
Now, though, the first digit has elbowed the dollar sign out of the clock altogether, and a $ has been manually stuck alongside so no one could think they were looking at, say, the Zimbabwean national debt instead.
An optimist might be tempted to sit and wait for President Obama or McCain to show some fiscal responsibility and get the debt down. After all the clock was actually decommissioned when budget surpluses at the end of the Clinton era started pushing the debt downwards.
But Douglas Durst, who inherited the clock when his father died in 1995, has another plan. He's commissioning another clock with another three, count 'em, zeroes – enough to handle a multi-quadrillion dollar debt. So even if inflation gets seriously out of control and every bank in America goes bust, the clock will keep bang up to date (until we run out of energy to power the thing).
Debt clocks are surprisingly popular in the US, with several scattered around the country. Perhaps it's time for a British version – a screen nailed to the side of Big Ben showing how much the partial nationalisation of our banks is costing us all, perhaps?
National Debt Clock runs out of zeroes – new larger clock ordered
When real estate developer Seymour Durst installed an electronic screen in Time Square in 1989 to show the size of the US national debt, he hoped that the glare of public attention might force Washington to cut the deficit. So were he still with us, he'd be unimpressed to learn that National Debt Clock has now run out of room.
The ballooning US national debt has now broken through the $10 trillion mark to reach $10,299.299,050,383 at the time of typing. President Bush must be very proud.
Perhaps understandably, Durst though that thirteen digits would be sufficient to record the debt (which was a mere $2.7tn in the days of Reagonomics), plus one digit for the dollar sign.
Now, though, the first digit has elbowed the dollar sign out of the clock altogether, and a $ has been manually stuck alongside so no one could think they were looking at, say, the Zimbabwean national debt instead.
An optimist might be tempted to sit and wait for President Obama or McCain to show some fiscal responsibility and get the debt down. After all the clock was actually decommissioned when budget surpluses at the end of the Clinton era started pushing the debt downwards.
But Douglas Durst, who inherited the clock when his father died in 1995, has another plan. He's commissioning another clock with another three, count 'em, zeroes – enough to handle a multi-quadrillion dollar debt. So even if inflation gets seriously out of control and every bank in America goes bust, the clock will keep bang up to date (until we run out of energy to power the thing).
Debt clocks are surprisingly popular in the US, with several scattered around the country. Perhaps it's time for a British version – a screen nailed to the side of Big Ben showing how much the partial nationalisation of our banks is costing us all, perhaps?