June 2016

The number two man in the Persian Empire offered a bribe of 10,000 talents to the king in return for permission to kill off all the Jews living under the authority of the king. Today’s question: what would the amount of that bribe be worth in today’s money?

The Old Testament book of Esther tells the story of Haman plotting to kill all the Jews living in the Persian Empire.  Esther then told King Xerxes about the plot. The King executed Haman and allowed the Jews to defend themselves from those planning to exterminate them. The Jews survived. Those who expected to slaughter them did not. That is the short version. For the full details, check out the book of Esther.

Hers is a wonderful story of realizing God put you in a place to do a job that only you can do. So many other delightful and encouraging aspects of the story. If you haven’t looked at it lately, check it out.

There is one particular verse in the story which overlaps my discussion of Alexander the Great looting the Persian Empire. …

An indication of Persian wealth from the book of EstherRead More »

After developing a few points of reference for comparing ancient finances to now, I can get back to pondering the value of loot Alexander the Great stole while on his military rampage, I mean campaign.

Following estimates of how much loot Alexander the Great hauled away is from Professor Frank Holt’s book The Treasures of Alexander the Great: How One Man’s Wealth Shaped the World which I previously mentioned. (Can you tell I enjoyed his book?)

I will revise my previous calculation of Alexander’s haul from Susa and then develop a point estimate for the value of proceeds from his biggest sacking.

Approximate value of the haul from looting Susa, the capital of Persia

The loot from Susa is described by Prof. Holt, and converted to a current value, as follows:

• 40,000 Talents of uncoined bullion, or raw silver
• 10,000 Talents of gold coins, which I will assume is expressed as the equivalent in silver
• 50,000 Talents – haul at Susa, estimated by Prof. Holt
• 400 years wages per talent, for a skilled laborer, adjusted for Great Enrichment at a factor of 40; could be as high as 80 or even 100
• 20,000,000 years wages
• 200,000 centuries of wages for an average worker
• $70,000 – average annual compensation package for a skilled construction worker today, calculated here
• $1,400,000,000,000 – really rough approximation of current wages today for skilled construction workers which would be vaguely comparable to loot hauled off from Susa
• $1.4 trillion – point estimate

…

Alexander the Great’s biggest hauls when looting citiesRead More »

I am building some reference points for my ongoing learning about ancient finances. (If you couldn’t tell, I’m have a lot of fun. This learnin’ thing is cool.)

Here is the value of all the stock listed on the market in the G-20 economies. This is the total capitalization of the companies in those countries.

Data is from this site. A lot of other sources could be used and other years might give different results. The accuracy of the valuation of Alexander’s loot is only accurate to one or two significant digits. The needed estimates and assumptions will leave any comparisons accurate to only one significant digit. Actually, by the time my calculations are finished, the amounts will probably be accurate to maybe overestimating 20% or perhaps underestimating by 100% or 200%.

Thus, more precision in the market capitalizations is irrelevant.

Amounts are in US dollars and are for 2012: …

Stock market capitalization as reference point for ancient financesRead More »