Million vs. billion vs. trillion

An animation

When the government misspends a million dollars, it is easy for the average person to be upset. A million dollars to us is a lot of money, but in fiscal year 2023, the U.S. government spent over 6 trillion dollars, and a million dollars isn’t much in a 6 trillion dollar budget.

To most of us, a million, a billion, and a trillion are all just large numbers, but there are differences in magnitude between the three. To help understand the difference, here is an animation comparing the three quantities.

The animation starts with an area of 1 million and then grows an area of 1 billion linearly, followed by growing an area of 1 trillion linearly. You can’t even see the million area square before the trillion area is done growing.

The R code that created this is at the end. If you enjoyed this animation, please consider sharing this post and subscribing (you can do it for free). Comments are welcome if you like the animation or have ideas on how to improve it.

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R code

## Packages

library(dplyr)
library(tidyr)
library(ggplot2)
library(animation)

## Colors

MyRed <- "#be4242"
MyPurple <- "#5B005B"
MyLightP <- "#dfdbdf"  
MyLightP2 <-  "#f8f4f8"  
MyLightP3 <- "#fcfafc"  
MyPurple3 <- "#7b327b"
MyPurple5 <-  "#9c669c"

## Data

StepN <-141

StepA <- data.frame(groupM = "Million",
                    valuesM = rep(1000, 141)
                    )

StepB <-  data.frame(groupB = "Billion",
                     valuesB = c(0, seq(1000, 31623, length.out = 70),
                                 rep(31623, 70) )
                     )


StepC <- data.frame(groupT="Trillion", 
                    valuesT = c(rep(0, 71), seq(31623, 1000000, length.out = 70) )
                    )

data <- data.frame(StepA,StepB,StepC)  

## Animation

saveGIF(
  {
   ani.options(interval = 0.20, nmax = 50)
    
   for (i in 1:StepN){

     Mrange <- max(data[i,2], data[i,4],data[i,6])
     Apt <- (Mrange/936)*4/3

     g1 <- ggplot(data[i,]) + 
             geom_rect(aes(xmin = 0, xmax  =valuesT, ymin = 0, ymax = valuesT), 
                           fill = MyPurple5) +
             geom_text(x = max( data[i, 6] / 2, data[75, 6] / 2), y = -12 * Apt,
                       label = "Trillion", fontface = 'bold', size = 8.5, color = MyPurple5) +
                 geom_rect(aes(xmin=0, xmax=valuesB, ymin=0, ymax=valuesB), fill = MyPurple3) + 
             geom_text(x = max( data[i, 4] / 2, data[5, 4] / 2), y = -10 * Apt,
                       label = "Billion", fontface = 'bold', size = 6.5, color = MyPurple3) +   
             geom_rect(aes(xmin = 0, xmax = valuesM, ymin = 0, ymax = valuesM), fill = MyRed) +
             geom_text(x = -10 * Apt,y = data[i, 2] / 2,label = 'Million', fontface = 'bold',
                       size = 4.5, color = MyRed, hjust = 0, angle = 90)+ 
             theme(plot.margin = unit(c(10, 10, 10, 10), "pt"),
                   axis.text = element_blank(),
                   axis.title = element_blank(),
                   plot.title = element_text(size = 20),
                   axis.ticks = element_blank(),
                   plot.background = element_rect(fill = MyLightP3),
                   panel.background = element_rect(fill = MyLightP), 
                   legend.background = element_rect(fill = MyLightP2),
                   plot.caption = element_text(hjust = 1, size = 14, color = MyPurple)) +
             labs(title = "Comparing Million, Billion, and Trillion",
                  caption = c("Briefed by Data || Thomas J Pfaff"))
                
     plot(g1)
     ani.pause()
    }
    
    for (k in 1:10){
      print(g1)
      ani.pause() }
    
  }, movie.name = "Mill-Bill-Trill.gif", ani.width = 936, ani.height = 936)