If Only Congress...

...were so bold and honest:

Report on the Recent Piggybanking Crisis by Eric Hague

The following report, prepared by a bipartisan committee comprising both Mommy and Daddy, lays out a timeline of the principal events of last week's Piggybanking Crisis and its aftermath.

4:15 p.m., LAST FRIDAY

Daughter Georgia becomes aware that Addison Murphy from next door is placing a recently refurbished dollhouse on the market at an asking price of $30. Because Georgia barely earns enough from her weekly chores to eke out the occasional candy purchase, she has never really considered herself a candidate for doll-homeownership. Nevertheless, she elects to pursue the classic dollhouse dream and begins to explore financing options.

4:24 p.m., LAST FRIDAY

Georgia consults older sister Johanna, the manager of a local piggybank with reserves totaling some $30.12, about the possibility of securing a mortgage. Although Johanna is aware of the meagerness of Georgia's allowance, she feels that the recent precipitous expansion of the neighborhood doll-housing market, coupled with the effects of informational asymmetries—namely, that Georgia can't really add yet—are enough to justify the risk.

4:31 p.m., LAST FRIDAY

Georgia closes on Addison's dollhouse. She moves two naked Barbies and a velociraptor into it.

12:00 p.m., SUNDAY

After receiving her allowance, Georgia makes her inaugural mortgage payment to the First Piggybank of Johanna's Room. Suddenly left with no funds with which to buy M&Ms on the weekly outing to Pathmark, Georgia begins to realize the enormity of her situation.

12:32 p.m., SUNDAY

Georgia lists her dollhouse with a local pretend-estate agent, Addison's older sister Emma.

7:04 p.m., MONDAY

Dumbledore, the family hamster, is found dead in his cage. Georgia is laid off from her job as chief pellet-refiller.

4:19 p.m., TUESDAY

Despite a promising open dollhouse with the twins from up on Fifth Street, Georgia still has not found a buyer. Facing the prospect of missing a mortgage payment, Georgia decides to walk away from her underwater dollhouse. She relocates her tenants to the big toy chest in the basement rumpus room.

4:22 p.m., TUESDAY

While Johanna is out at the swingset negotiating the sale of Georgia's subprime dollhouse mortgage to Jackson Meyers from two houses down, Georgia apprises Johanna that she is defaulting on her debt. Johanna announces immediate plans to foreclose on the dollhouse.

8:12 p.m., TUESDAY

Confronting a shortfall of Piggybank liquidity, Johanna appears before Mommy and Daddy and requests a bailout. (See minutes from "Tantrum before the Parental Subcommittee on Finance.")

8:14 p.m., TUESDAY

Members of the fiscally liberal Daddy Party announce support for a short-term emergency loan to the First Piggybank. The Mommy Party adopts the view that, though Johanna is a big girl now, she is not too big to fail. Following a vigorous debate in both the house and the carport, the Daddy Party unilaterally authorizes the lending of $30 to Johanna from the Disney World savings jar on top of the fridge.

10:26 a.m., WEDNESDAY

During morning recess, Johanna acquires $30 through the perpetration of a Ponzi scheme involving the fraudulent trade of Silly Bandz commodities.

3:31 p.m., THURSDAY

Georgia files a choreless claim with Daddy during the Pathmark trip. Daddy grants Georgia a distribution of candy benefits.

5:42 p.m., FRIDAY

Johanna repays the Disney World treasury in full. In spite of this, the Mommy Party attacks the opposition during mid-dinner debate, castigating it for its failure to live up to its promises to create new chores, as well as for its wasteful candy entitlement programs. Desperate to shore up support among daughters of all backgrounds, the Daddy Party announces that the Disney World vacation will happen next month—and that he'll just charge the trip on his MasterCard.

The Mommy Party opposes this increase in the household debt ceiling. Talks quickly stall, and the Daddy Party is forced to sleep on the smelly couch in the rumpus room.

6:30 p.m., FRIDAY

Aiming to draw attention to the disparity of wealth that exists between younger sisters and greedy investment piggybankers, Georgia decides to occupy Johanna's room with a blanket fort. Johanna soon finds herself mildly inconvenienced by Georgia's vague, ineffectual whining and chants of "I am the 50 percent!"

11:30 a.m., SATURDAY

The Daddy Party calls for an end to unproductive inter-party bickering as well as for his return to the Mommy Party's bed because his back hurts from that damn couch.

CONCLUSIONS

The parental government would like all daughters—regardless of socioeconomic status—to know that even if these conflicts ultimately prove insoluble and in time precipitate a complete parental shutdown, none of this is actually the fault of the general populace of children, and the Mommy Party and the Daddy Party love them both very, very much.