$3,550,000,000,000

That's the current budget number under consideration for next year's spending. This is a low-ball figure, as it excludes various expenditures that aren't represented in the annual appropriations process.

That's $9.7 billion per day.

That's a big number, and it's tough to find real world equivalencies that capture it. How about, the domestic movie industry, which in 2008 brought in a box office total of $9.8 billion.

So in a single day of operation our government spends the equivalent of what every man, woman, and child spent all year long at movie theaters.