At His Peak Pablo Escobar Was Losing $2.1 Billion A Year Due To Rats Eating Money In Storage

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Business Insider- At the peak of his power, infamous Medellín cartel boss Pablo Escobar brought in an estimated $US420 million a week in revenue, making him easily one of the wealthiest drug lords in history. Known as the “king of cocaine”, Escobar’s wealth was so immense that he stashed piles of cash in Colombian farming fields, dilapidated warehouses, and in the walls of cartel members’ homes, according to Roberto Escobar, the cartel’s chief accountant and the kingpin’s brother, in his book, “The Accountant’s Story: Inside the violent world of the Medellín cartel.” “Pablo was earning so much that each year we would write off 10% of the money because the rats would eat it in storage or it would be damaged by water or lost,” Escobar wrote. That would be about $US2.1 billion dollars, given how much money he was reportedly making. Escobar simply had more money than he knew to do with, and therefore haphazardly losing money to rodents and mould wasn’t an issue.

 

So I’m obsessed with Pablo Escobar right now and it’s because of the Netflix show Narcos.  As you probably know it’s all about Pablo Escobar and his rise to power in the drug world.  I will read any and all stories about Pablo Escobar and be completely fascinated.  I burned through all 10 episodes of Narcos last weekend and you should do the same when you’re not busy watching football.  It’s pretty awesome.  I basically thought I was a drug dealer after binge watching 7 hours in a row.  I think I could do it.  I keep saying “Plata o Plomo” to people.  Narcos isn’t the greatest show in the world but it doesn’t try to be. The people who made it knew exactly what they were doing.  They know lots of people, like me, love over-the-top lavish drug lord dramas.  It’s that simple and Narcos has it all.  There’s violence, drugs, money, betrayal, hookers, crooked cops, politicians, nudity, everything.  The whole nine yards.  No topic is more perfect for that than Pablo Escobar ‘s rise. I highly recommend giving it a shot.

 

What would it be like to have so much money that you can lose 2.1 billion dollars a year and not care?  It’s impossible to even fathom.  I would assume you just stop thinking about money all together which is a reality I can’t place myself into.  Money is everything to me all the time.  Mostly because I don’t have nearly enough of it.  Then there’s Pablo Escobar feeding billions of dollars to rodents every year and not even noticing it in his bottom line.  Remember the movie Blow?  Great movie.  There’s a scene in that movie where they stop counting the money by hand and simply weighing it in boxes because there’s so much of it.  I always thought that was fascinating for whatever reason.  And Penelope Cruz is super hot in it so that helps.

 

PS- The only downside to Narcos is it’s all in subtitles.  LOTS of reading.  More reading than I’ve done since back when I was in school.  You get used to it though. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have to take breaks every once in a while to let my brain recharge. Blogging all day every day melts your brain to a certain degree.