The Bailout In Context

While I've got a whiskey review and some Thanksgiving wine suggestions on the stove for when I get home from work today, thought I'd post this gem that arrived in my email box yesterday. I think it puts things in perspective nicely. Credit goes to Boing Boing;

In doing the research for the "Bailout Nation" book, I needed a way to put
the dollar amounts into proper historical perspective. If we add in the Citi
bailout, the total cost now exceeds $4.6165 trillion dollars. People have a hard
time conceptualizing very large numbers, so let's give this some context.

The current Credit Crisis bailout is now the largest outlay In American history.
Crunching the inflation adjusted numbers, we find the bailout has cost more than
all of these big budget government expenditures – combined:

• Marshall Plan: Cost: $12.7 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $115.3 billion

• Louisiana Purchase: Cost: $15 million, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $217 billion

• Race to the Moon: Cost: $36.4 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $237 billion

• S&L Crisis: Cost: $153 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $256 billion

• Korean War: Cost: $54 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $454 billion

• The New Deal: Cost: $32 billion (Est), Inflation Adjusted Cost: $500 billion (Est)

• Invasion of Iraq: Cost: $551b, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $597 billion

• Vietnam War: Cost: $111 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $698 billion

• NASA: Cost: $416.7 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $851.2 billion

TOTAL: $3.92 trillion