Bad Metaphors, Bad Policy: Why the Economy Isn’t an Engine

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We’ve been sold a lie—one built on metaphors that sound smart but fuel disastrous policy. In this sharp critique, we unpack the mechanical clichés used to describe the economy—“priming the pump,” “turbocharging growth,” “tapping the brakes”—and explain how these simplistic images distort reality. The economy isn’t a machine. It’s not a car, an engine, or something that can be “fixed” with the push of a button by central planners. It’s a living, breathing system—like nature—and attempts to control or “tune it up” with stimulus, subsidies, or regulation often do far more harm than good. When politicians and pundits mistake complexity for something they can manage, we all pay the price. The solution? Stop trying to fix what isn’t broken. Just step aside and let it breathe.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Watchdog on Wall Street podcast explaining the news coming
out of the complex worlds of finance, economics, and politics
and the impact it we'll have on everyday Americans. Author,
investment banker, consumer advocate, analyst, and trader Chris Markowski the Alexium.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Bad metaphors make bad policy. Yeah. Do you ever notice
that when they talk about pre market, they talk about
the economy, they always like to compare it to some
sort of mechanical device All the time. When the economy

(00:42):
is humming along, right, economy is going well, it's it's
humming along all or chugging along. When the economy not
doing that, well, old gez stalled, starts sputtering, sputtering. Well,
then what does the Fed have to do? Oh we

(01:03):
gotta prime the pump. Got to prime with stimulus spending.
Gotta do that. Oh yeah, that's that's so the economy
can can escape, can reach escape velocity. Right. Tax cuts right,
we're here in US now. Tax cuts and more federal

(01:23):
spending can fuel growth or turbo charge it. Money gets
pumped into it, pumped into it like gas. Economists are
always looking for red lights flashing right, because what the
economy gets too hot, too revved up too much reduct

(01:44):
it could overheat. So then what then the FED has
to do?

Speaker 1 (01:48):
What?

Speaker 2 (01:48):
Oh, it's got to tap the brakes, hitting the brakes
too hard up that can drive the economy into a ditch.
Several years ago there was an Investor Business Daily a
piece talking about this. Again, the purpose of metaphors is
to help people to understand topics that might be somewhat

(02:11):
complicated or abstract. But again, the use of these types
of metaphors are wrong and leads to what bad metaphors
bad policy. We talked about the market, What is the market?
What is the economy? What does it mean? And I

(02:33):
was to talk about all the interactions and random events
that happen over the course of a day. And I
always suggest people, well, I think they can control this.
I said, really, look out your window and watch nature
for a while. Is there anything the slightest bit mechanical

(02:55):
about life, markets, the economy that's life. Comparing the economy
or the markets to an engine means that it's made
up of parts that interact in precise ways, and that
if they break down, can be easily fixed by smart technicians.

(03:18):
It suggests that pushing the right buttons and flipping the
right switches, adding the right mix of fuel and the
proper amounts will keep it running smoothly. What do we
get after bed metaphors? Brust us toward bad policy, stimulus
plans that don't stimulate, fed policy causing recessions, jobs programs

(03:43):
that don't create jobs, bailouts that don't solve, cash for
clunker programs that just don't do anything, just push up
when people are going to buy cars, take use cars
off the market. Anyway. They extend the problem at hand,
Subsidies that cause a disconnecting markets, inflate prices, tax code

(04:07):
that's incomprehensible. The reality is mentioned this before on the
program Favorite Comedian of mine, George Carlin. They talked about
nature one time and he said, the planet has been
through a lot worse than us been through earthquakes, volcanoes,

(04:29):
plate tectonics, continental drift, solar flares, sun spots, magnetic storms,
the magnetic reversal of the polls, hundreds of thousands of
years of bombardment, comments and asteroids and meteors, worldwide floods,
title waves, worldwide fires, erosion, cosmic rays, reoccurring ice ages.
And we think some plastic bags and some aluminum cans
are going to make a difference. The planet isn't going

(04:50):
anywhere we are. We're going away. Pack your bags, folks,
we're going away, and we won't leave much of a
trace either, maybe a little styrofall. The planet will be
here and will be long gone. The planet will be
here for a long, long long time after we're gone,
and it will heal itself, cleanse itself, because that's what

(05:10):
it does. It's a self correcting system. Okay, you think
about the wildfires and stuff that take place from time
to time, and after the fires, you see all the
flowers that are grown. We can't fix nature. We can't
make a rainforest come back. We cannot make endangered species reappear.
We cannot fix a coral reef. We also cannot fix

(05:31):
or save the economy. What we can do is leave
them alone and they will repair themselves. The free market
is a self correcting system. Just get out of the way.
Watch dog on Wall Street dot Com