How Not To Imagine Big Piles Of Things

[tongodeon]

This website is making the rounds in a few of my circles, and it frustrates me. Numbers ending in "-illion" and require context, but visualizations comparing giant things to other giant things seem unproductive or counterproductive. Visualizing the size of a stack of $100 bills representing "US unfunded liabilities" is meaningless without a similar

Comments

[talldean]

The debt is being used to finance non-durable goods.

I think it's safer to compare that to 47k$ in credit card debt, not 47k$ in debt on real estate that we own.

If everyone in the US had $50k of credit card debt, and was spending more debt faster than they paid the existing ones, and were trying to get their credit limit extended...

...that feels like a more accurate analogy.

[mmcirvin]

I think part of the current political problem is that the debt limit gets analogized to a credit limit, when it's really more like a limit above which the borrower refuses to pay the minimum balance.

[mmcirvin]

...uh, minimum monthly payment, I mean.

[talldean]

A credit limit is the most money a bank thinks that they can lend you and have you keep paying the minimum balance, isn't it?

[mmcirvin]

Yeah, but when you go over they stop lending--they still expect you to pay up!