Question

1. As the story begins, the author says that more than a billion pencils

Answer 1

Answer:

Not a single person.

Explanation:

In the essay "I, Pencil" by Leonard E. Read, the author says that though about one and one-half billion pencils are produced in US alone each year, he says that not a single person in the whole earth knows how to actually make a pencil.

The author says that the economy of the country could never be systematically planned when not even a single person possesses the skills to even make a pencil. The writer uses the word 'pencil' to represent the most simplest tool yet how no one actually has the skills to make one in the country.