Absolutely True! or not--please read on.
[It was around the time of 8th grade algebra that I first heard the claim that if you invested a penny in a savings account when Christ was born, your savings account would now be worth more than the total wealth of the world. At the time, an interest rate of around 4% was assumed. and the claim was absolutely true. If you use today's savings account rates, perhaps not so much] A penny invested in the Bank of Perpetual Solvency and Stability at year 0 at 4% per annum compounded yearly would be worth around 2.27 x 1032 dollars today. In non-scientific notation that's 227 nonillion dollars. That's a lot of money. The current total wealth of the world is estimated to be around 250 Trillion dollars. So your savings account would now be worth ten million trillion times the total wealth of the world today. Of course, interest rates have fluctuated wildly through the years. Even small changes have enormous impact. If you assume todays savings rate, often 1% or less, then your savings account would be worth a paltry 5 million dollars or less. If you were able to get 2%, then it balloons to a respectable 2221 Trillion dollars, or still about ten times the current wealth of the world.
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