In March of 2012, Mega Millions Frenzy swept the country as the jackpot rose to a whopping $640,000,000. Because somebody has to win, right? Go ahead and give it a shot. Odds of 1 in 170,000,000 never seemed more impossible.
While reading the brilliant book by Jane Leavy, I learned that in 1961, Mickey Mantle became the highest paid player in baseball after signing a contract for $75,000 per year. In my search to figure out how that compares to today's superstars in 2012 dollars (it doesn't), I found many web-based inflation calculators, but none that I liked. Here's my attempt to make an inflation calculator a little more elegant.
In 2011, a tech company (that was 3 months from bankruptcy just 15 years prior), was approaching the market capitalization of the behemoth Exxon Mobil. I used this tool to track the progress. The rest is history.