With eight billion
people on the planet,
things can feel pretty crowded.
Let’s make things a bit tighter
by housing every single person on Earth
in one giant skyscraper.
But a building big enough
for all eight billion of us
doesn't exist yet.
We're going to have to build one
from the ground up.
But before we do,
let's start small and work our way up
with one that could hold
at least a country or two.
We'll start with some of the least populated countries
and move on to the most gigantic
skyscraper Earth has ever seen.
Could it reach the Moon?
When we talk about cramming everyone on Earth in the same space,
equality is one of the top issues we'd face.
You know, in the real world,
we say things to low-income people like,
"pull yourself up by your bootstraps."
But that phrase denies the reality of the working class or,
very often, the working poor.
Look, sometimes, we all need a hand,
especially when you're already pushing yourself to the limit.
And you shouldn't feel ashamed for accepting the help you need.
Government programs like the child tax credit go a long way
toward reducing the stigma of receiving support
from social programs because they work and they keep our children fed.
The Child Tax credit of 2021 kept nearly 2.9 million children
out of poverty by giving nearly $3,600 per child
to working families.
And if you want to extend this legislation
to 2023 there is a small window
between midterm elections and Winter recess to get it done.
We have the chance to make sure our neighbors and communities don't go without.
Because, just like in this skyscraper,
we're all stuck here together.
For this experiment,
you'd be housing 10,000 people on each floor.
And that would make your Iceland building
almost half as tall as the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
That's not as exciting as
some of our next skyscrapers are about to get.
And it would only take you just over
two minutes to get to its top floor.
Which would be floor 34.
Still, it would be good practice
for you to figure out the infrastructure
to support all your residents.
Next on the list, the Australia skyscraper.
Now this is where things get interesting.
Because at 10 km (6.2 mi) high,
this building would be taller than Mount Everest.
And to commute all the way
to the top of your Australia skyscraper,
you'd need to spend two hours and 40 minutes one-way.
But that's nothing compared to our next engineering feat.
To shelter every resident of the UK,
you'd need to think bigger than Big Ben's height.
Like almost 300 times bigger.
Your UK skyscraper would have a whopping 6,800 floors.
It would reach a height of 27 km (17 mi).
And after floor 4,500,
you'd now be above the clouds.
The Philippines is home to over one hundred million people.
And to house all of them,
your skyscraper would need to be 40 km (24.8 mi) high.
This man-made monolith would have 10,000 floors.
And most of it would be above the clouds.
It would take you 11 hours
to get to the top floor of the Philippines skyscraper.
So hopefully you don't have to come down all that often.
Moving on up to something a little taller,
your Mexico building
would be a jaw-dropping 52 km (32.3 mi) high.
That's twice as tall as the tallest mountain in the Solar System,
Olympus Mons on Mars.
It would take you 14.5 hours
to travel all the way up to its 13,000th floor.
Once there, you’re halfway to outer space.
But at least you'd still have the atmosphere around you.
I can't say that about your next megastructure.
The U.S. skyscraper would be really, really tall,
reaching a height of 132 km (82 mi).
And after floor 25,000,
you’d officially be in space.
Pretty cool, huh?
But only if you don't think about the wild temperatures
just outside your window.
The top of this building would be in the thermosphere.
And contrary to what you might think,
this layer is incredibly hot,
rising to 2,500 °C (4,500 °F).
But if you were to open a window, you'd feel cold.
That's because in this layer of our atmosphere
there are not enough air molecules
to transfer that heat to you.
Oh, and that would also make breathing impossible.
So you'd really need to focus
on installing a proper oxygen support system.
You know, for the penthouse tenants to survive.
OK, on to one of the most populated countries in the world.
The India skyscraper would be unimaginably tall,
reaching a height of 552 km (343 mi).
That's 138,000 floors.
And to get to the top,
you should expect a travel time in excess of six days.
If I lived way up there,
I don't think I'd ever go down.
India skyscraper would be taller
than the orbit of satellites
and even the International Space Station.
Now that you'd be in space,
you'd really need to build proper oxygen, water and waste systems.
You'd have to think about how to feed all those people,
because transporting food from the ground
would be virtually impossible.
And now, to the tallest skyscraper of all time,
the super megastructure that would hold all eight billion of us.
The Earth Tower might not reach the Moon,
but it would be almost as tall as the Moon's diameter.
This incredible structure would have 800,000 floors.
And it would peak at a mind-boggling 3,200 km (1,990 mi).
Depending on where you'd live here, you'd see planes,
satellites and the ISS.
It's somewhat ironic that most of the Earth Tower would be in space,
well above our planet's atmosphere.
Forget about a balcony with a view of the Moon.
You wouldn't want to go outside
unless you were wearing a spacesuit.
OK, now let's talk about trying to piece the tower together.
In addition to its own weight,
it would need to support the weight
of the entire global population.
At about 356 million tons,
this would already be nearly 1,000 times
heavier than the Empire State Building.
To provide everyone with clean water,
add to that the equivalent of
4.5 million Olympic-sized swimming pools
that will be consumed every day.
And I'm not even talking about food
or other essential stuff here.
The lower floors of this megastructure
would be dark and gloomy.
There'd likely be high crime rates
as people did whatever it takes to survive.
The top floors would belong to the rich.
They'd be dependent upon the work of these lower levels.
Life would be complicated in our giant new skyscraper.
Infectious diseases could spread
at never-before-seen speeds.
Overcrowding would lead to widespread mental health issues.
But at least you’d have an incredible amount of room
to enjoy outdoors on the ground level
with everyone in one building.
Only your elevator commute from the very top floor to the bottom
would take you about 37 days.
Maybe things could be worse
than living way up high in the sky.
Like what if every single person lived underground.
Well, that’s a story
for another WHAT IF.