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Right now, people are fascinated with Elon Musk’s net worth.
It’s certainly news-worthy - he’s the first trillionaire in history.
Today I want to put a trillion dollars into perspective and what it really means for Elon.
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How much is a trillion dollars, really?
I don’t think people really understand what a trillion is.
We use it to describe company valuations, and now individual net worth and it just seems like a regular number.
It’s not.
Consider this:
One million seconds is about 11 and a half days
One billion seconds is 31.7 years
One trillion seconds is 31,709 years
How about this graphic?
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A trillion dollars isn’t just ‘a lot’.
It’s orders of magnitude bigger than millions and billions.
What’s wealth for?
Some people probably view wealth as a way to keep score of your success.
Some use it as an ego boost, to measure themselves against others.
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But I like Charlie Munger’s description of what wealth is for.
He was asked in an interview if given the choice, he’d go back into the investment business.
Here’s what he said:
“Well, probably because it suits my nature. But I didn’t really enjoy the three and 30 business. Once I had enough money on my own, I’d rather just operate with my own money. That is a much better way of doing it than being forced to sell, being forced to deal with investment bankers, being forced to deal with investment consultants, being forced to deal with venture capital. To hell with them. Who wants it? You don’t need other people. The point of getting rich is so you don’t have to need other people, so you don’t have to get along with others.”
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For Charlie, the point wasn’t to be ri