On wacko notions & metaphor

Reading Time: 10 minutes read

On  19 January 2023, the US hit the statutory debt ceiling  – the amount of money Congress allows the US to borrow. Unless something is done — and quickly — the US government will no longer be able to keep paying its bills.

The Democrats want to raise the debt ceiling to meet the government’s obligations, and then negotiate next year’s overall levels of federal spending. As President Biden declared, “America is not a deadbeat nation.”

By contrast, the Republicans refuse to agree to a clean debt ceiling increase, with no spending trade-offs. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy proposes a return to 2022 spending levels and a 1% cap on future federal spending over the next ten years. Suggested spending cuts would derail Biden’s student debt relief effort, scale back on railway and airport safety, reduce federal support for local law enforcement, and more.

Biden’s evaluation? “Spending cuts for working- and middle class folks…with tax cuts for those at the top of the pile”: more GOP “wacko notions.” No negotiation.

So here we are. The stage is set a catastrophic default, while we wait for someone to blink.

But in the meantime, there’s metaphor!

Kevin McCarthy explains his debt ceiling proposal as follows:

If you gave your child a credit card and they kept hitting the limit, you wouldn’t just raise the credit limit. You’d sit down with them and help them to figure out where they could cut back on spending. The same thing is true of our national debt.

With this, he harnesses the power of metaphor, explaining an incredibly complex concept  in terms of something more recognizable. While few of us have experience in running a vast national economy, many more of us have experience running our own households. We also have experience with (at least some sort of) parenting, from the giving and/or receiving end. All of that ostensibly helps us understand McCarthy’s reasoning.

But of course, metaphor is a not only a compelling explanatory tool. It can also help persuade people to come around to your way of thinking — certainly what McCarthy is hoping for.

But there is a catch. A metaphor can be resisted.

For a real-life example of how this happens in practice, look no further than McCarthy’s own Twitter thread on the topic.

What does the Twitter universe think about McCarthy’s analogy? Take a look at this selection of tweets:

About the parents

Who got us into this mess in the first place?

• … if my abusive ex-husband had more than doubled the kid’s debts before splitting in an Adderall binge of entitlement, I’d not harm the kid.
• Except that Congress is the one who keeps spending and cutting taxes and now refusing to pay for debt they created.
• Turns out that you absolutely LOVE maxing out the credit card but instead of owning up to it you point to your sibling and blame it on them. Kevin, we have the receipts.

Who is the cardholder that allowed the purchases?

• Let’s take your analogy to the logical conclusion. Your child is using the credit card under your account. Would you just default on the card and not pay the bill and totally screw up your credit score? NO. You’d first make sure you don’t default. Get it?
• If you gave your child a credit card & a list of things he can buy, would you refuse to pay the bill after he bought the things on the list? THAT is the truth of our debt. You want to SEEM fiscally responsible even as you keep giving him that list.

And what kind of parents would give a credit card to their child anyway?

• Is my last name Kardashian?
• Who gives a child a credit card? Is it the same people who give two-year-olds a shotgun?

About the child

• Kevin is the child in this scenario telling his siblings on the joint account not to spend anymore because he already maxed out the card limit after he raised the debt limit several times.
• We are not raising children in Congress. You all have a fiduciary and fiscal responsibility to the American people…

About the purchases

• I think the actually correct analogy is you gave your grandma a credit card to spend on her healthcare and groceries. But she keeps hitting the limit. So you tell her to skip some doctors visits and not eat as much.
• I wouldn’t let my child invest my money either. But I would want the best public education, police and fire protection, transportation system, health care, military defense, & long-term maintenance of our national park system and a healthy planet for my children & grandchildren.

About credit cards

Is a credit card limit really like the debt ceiling?

• The debt ceiling is not like a credit card credit limit. You, in Congress, still spend over the ceiling regardless of where it’s set and that’s why it has to be raised. If you want to cut spending, do it on the spending bills.
• True. But the debt limit is about paying expenses that have already taken place.

Who do we owe?

• But we’re not just the credit card holder. We’re the credit card company as well. In that case, yes I would simply raise the limit.

What about actually paying the credit card bill?

• You maxed out the credit card & are obligated to pay the balance. You already bought everything you could & now you HAVE to pay the bill. This isn’t about extending credit. It’s about paying for the things you bought or you go to collections & that’s very bad for our country.
• So if America doesn’t have to pay its debts can I also not pay my credit cards back? Seems a little unfair doesn’t it
• You would also tell your child that they ran up these bills, they need to pay them, and perhaps they’ll need to get a second job (for a gov’t that means increase their income. i.e. tax increase) to make good on their debts.

What happens to people who don’t pay down their credit card debt?

• Would you also tell your child “don’t worry about paying the bill – just stick it to the credit card company and see how that works out…not like you need something called a “credit score” for a decent shot at a life not spent under a bridge.”
• I like the analogy. So after your kid runs up the credit card you plan on paying it off and canceling it and not defaulting on it ruining your own credit score correct.

About the real teaching moment

• But first you’d pay the bills, Kev–then go ahead and show your kid how *you’d* make a budget. You don’t want to pay the bills, and haven’t shared what your budget would look like.
• Yeah. The negotiation is over future budgets. I would teach my children to pay the money that they owe people and not to default on their obligations. Then the lesson would be to figure out how to reign in the high stress spending.

About the analogy itself

• Ah yes, because managing a household budget and managing a national economy with global implications are totally the same thing. Why didn’t we think of that before?
• Exactly! When will people understand running an economy of 350 million people and infinite industries and a military and international obligations is the same as managing a child with a credit card?
• complete nonsense a country is not like a household you have the IQ of a flea

Any metaphorical scenario, such as the ‘household planning’ or ‘child-raising’ scenario which McCarthy set up, has various features– in this case, correspondences between different elements of domestic life and those of government economy. Who is the parent in this analogy? Who is the child? What has been purchased? Metaphor offers no single unambiguous interpretation; rather, any rich analogy allows for different entailments. And because of this, we can reframe an analogy that we disagree with, to something that more closely aligns with our values and beliefs.

If ever you find yourself in Speaker McCarthy’s situation, you would well-advised to remember that a metaphor can have a flip side. Metaphors can work for you, but they can also work against you.

Choose them with care.

Check out this blog post for more about resistance to metaphor!