American International Group Inc. managed to lose $62 billion in the fourth quarter -- the biggest quarterly loss in corporate history. Beyond just financial markets, this super-sized loss stands out:
•It could have funded the salaries of every major league baseball player last year -- about 23 times over.
•It's more than Bill Gates' net worth of $57 billion, according to Forbes magazine.
•It's about the same amount that the U.S. government provided for immediate relief and rescue efforts in the months after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
•If it were spread across the U.S. population, Americans could each get about $200.
•It's almost as much as the $67.4 billion that Americans spent at Wal-Mart in the fourth quarter, including the holiday season.
•For one person to lose that much money, it would take someone spending $1 million a day, every day, the next 169 years. AIG did it in just 92 days.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
