SortStack #3139 — 2035-01-12

By price · Order from cheapest to most expensive.

1. A Big Mac in the United States, on average $5.80

   The Economist's 'Big Mac Index' uses this burger's price worldwide as a playful gauge of whether currencies are over- or undervalued.

2. New Kim, the world's most expensive racing pigeon $1.9M

   A Chinese buyer won the 2020 auction for the Belgian hen. Pigeon racing's huge prize purses in China have turned top breeding birds into seven-figure assets.

3. Thirty seconds of advertising time during the Super Bowl $8M

   In 1967, a Super Bowl ad cost about $42,000. Brands now spend millions more on celebrity talent and production than on the airtime itself.

4. The Louisiana Purchase, as the US paid France $15M

   The 1803 nominal price bought about 2.1 million square kilometers — roughly three cents per acre — and doubled the size of the United States overnight.

5. Dennis Tito's trip to the International Space Station as the first space tourist $20M

   NASA objected so strongly to the 2001 visit that Tito trained in Russia and flew on a Soyuz — NASA staff were initially told not to assist him.

6. Constructing the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building $1.5B

   It was renamed at the last minute for the president of Abu Dhabi, whose emirate bailed out Dubai during the 2009 debt crisis — it was to be called Burj Dubai.

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