Does everyone now call a billion a trillion? and why?

It is an example of the Americanisation of the English language. It is not always recognised just how large the figures are, for example, a million [10^6] seconds is just over 11 days, but a US billion [10^9] seconds is over 31 years, and an 'old' [GB] billion/modern US trillion [10^12] seconds is over 31,000 years.  

I'M Going WAY BACK on this. I used to wonder how long would it be before we started saying, BILLION. Over the last month or maybe longer I've heard TRILLION pop up on the news.

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PS.

What's the next one after TRILLION LM? I've Got it, its QUADRILLION. One things for sure I wont be around to hear anyone saying/using that. :-) 

In the UK ..

a Million is 1,000,000 (six zeros)

and a Billion is 1,000,000,000,000 (twelve zeros .. twice as many zeros as a Million)

BUT

In the USA ..

a Million is 1,000,000 (six zeros)

a Billion is 1,000,000,000 (nine zeros)

and a Trillion is 1,000,000,000,000 (twelve zeros)

So .. in America ..  a ''UK Billion'' is a Trillion

A million - 1,000,000

A billion - 1,000,000,000 (one thousand million)

A trillion - 1,000,000,000,000 (one million, million)

Pretty much, The Americans and economists wanted a word for 'A thousand Million', so they stole 'billion' and called the real billion 'trillion'.  Without much mathematical logic being applied.

I'm not sure what the real trillion is now called, it's 10^18 so it is a million times 10^12 - so maybe a quintillion is what a trillion now gets called

UK engish billion = million x million. USA english billion = 1000 x million. therefore they are mixing UK and USA english together to say trillion. You need to read the primary source to find the correct figure