It's hard to think about the Federal Budget in terms we can understand. A moderately successful American will, over the course of a forty year career, earn several million dollars. But we don't even see all that money all at once. Numbers a million times bigger than our total lifetime earnings literally boggle the imagination.
One enterprising videoblogger, however, has undertaken to illustrate the impact of Obama's recently announced $100 million in budget cuts:
Copyright © 2010 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All rights reserved.
That was pretty clever, and lucid to boot.
There's a simple solution. Obama should twist his hand around, smirk, and put his pinky by his mouth, while emphasizing the number (e.g., "one MILLION dollars!"). Research shows this method causes any number to appear ridiculuously large.
"It's hard to think about the Federal Budget in terms we can understand."
It isn't hard at all if you use a relevant context. For example, compare it to the size of the U.S. economy. This is the sort of thing mildly numerate and economically literate people do all the time.
That's a neat video but am I the only one who thinks the creator could have stood to clean up his apartment before filming?
I mean, sure, my place is a mess too, but I'm not putting out viral videos using it as the background!
To DaveinHackensack: I agree that your method works for fairly (I'd go beyond 'mildly' but it's really just semantics) numerate and economically literate people, but do you have any idea of how small a group that really is?
The average person can't concieve of the amount of money represented by the size of the U.S. economy either. It's somewhat like explaining the size of a griffin by saying it's about 1/4 the size of a manticore. Great, but only if you have some way of processing the size of a manticore.
The size of the US economy is so unfathomably large to most people that it seem eminently reasonable that no crazy idea can be "too expensive" to pay for out of that literally unimaginably large sum. Thus to disagree with nice-sounding policies is to betray your venal soul.
To be fair but this is a reaction to the John McCain debate? When the crisis started he and the GOP were all about the expensive landmark spending. 2 million here... 300,000 there. And these were the presidential debates - not a 5 minute afternoon event.
Great find Megan. It's one of the more clear visual illustration I've seen of the magnitude of difference between seemingly big numbers.
Cool video, and certainly striking. I'd recommend the book 'innumeracy' for anyone interested in getting a handle on huge numbers. (Or finding out why you can't get such a handle)
However, when I watch this video, I'm not struck by what a liar Obama is. It actually was clear to me that $100 Million was essentially nothing even when Obama brought it up during the press conference. But I thought the same thing when the GOP has been, as a party writ large, SCREAMING about 'earmarks' and 'pork-barrel spending': They aren't even addressing the real problem.
What this video says to me is that NOBODY in Washington is serious about addressing our long-term financial insolvency crisis. Wake me up when someone, anyone, starts talking about ending ag subsidies, shrinking the military, and means-testing entitlements. Anyone not talking about those things isn't being serious, whether it's Obama or anyone else.
You can make a sort of weak argument against earmarks. The argument is that they're essentially out in the open bribes. As such if you cut a small amount of money out you'll get even more out then you think because that missing money was the incentive behind large unnecessary projects. The thinking being that if I could hand the bank teller $20 to add an extra 0 to my balance he might do it - the cost to him is 0 so why not?
I'm not saying it's a strong argument might there might be something to it.
I'm not sure how weak this is. When I was in D.C. I went to a budget/appropriations seminar. The people giving the seminar (other hill staffers) explained that each office submits projects they want funded to the committee, and that if a congress person ever votes against a omnibus bill after getting an earmark for the project, they'll never get an earmark again, and therefore their district will get screwed in the federal appropriations process in the future.
If congress didn't get to ensure funding for their pet project, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't be so quick to shovel out our money. However, I'm still not sure how much of an effect this would have on the large incentive to promise future expenditures, such as SS/Medicare
Nice video...really nice.
The innumeracy picture is pretty ugly according to surveys. This one was put out by The Center for Economic and Entrepreneurial Literacy. Read it and weep:
"According to our survey, the same math problems plaguing 15 year-olds continue to vex us into adulthood. The average American cannot answer basic math questions involving percentages.
For example, 65% of respondents could not identify what remained if you subtracted 25% from 8. Another question revealed that one in three adults could not calculate 1% of 50,000."
67.8% of statistics are invented on the spot.
Really? I heard it was more like 85% of stats that are made up...
(Good find Marc.)
Thanks for making the video. It takes quite a bit of time and I found it useful.
(and no blighter - i didn't think he should tidy up first. he made the video that's the key)
What this video says to me is that NOBODY in Washington is serious about addressing our long-term financial insolvency crisis. Wake me up when someone, anyone, starts talking about ending ag subsidies, a hair cut for the military, nourkrin and means-testing entitlements. Anyone not talking about those things isn't being serious, whether it's Obama or anyone else.