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A comment on Credit-Card Debt Nears $1 Trillion as Banks Push Plastic. Parent comment

Re:Credit-Card Debt Nears $1 Trillion as Banks Push Plastic by mac01021 on Saturday May 21, 2016 @09:53AM (#11744661)
But why does that make analogies to household finance invalid? It may also make sense for a household to take on debt if there is projected income growth.

Also, isn't the accumulation of body fat the definition of a surplus, rather than a deficit? In both cases, having run a surplus in the past provides protection for when you must run a deficit in the future.

Furthermore, are you suggesting that, a metabolic analogy is more correct than a household-finance analogy?

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Re:Credit-Card Debt Nears $1 Trillion as Banks Push Plastic by ArkyBeagle on Saturday May 21, 2016 @03:29PM (#11745836)
The Household Debt Fallacy is a specialization of the Fallacy of Composition.

1) The debt is eclipsed by GDP rise over time. 2) A government ( at least used to ) be able to very slightly weaken its currency to equalize for GDP and population growth. 3) Mild inflation acts to equalize the effects of private debt as well.

I use the metabolic analogy because the risks of no body fat and low body fat are quite different, much as the risks of mild inflation and no inflation - or more accurately, deflation - are quite different.

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