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Actually, debt is held by the US Government, which has had historic average revenues of ~18% GDP. Therefore, to have 100% debt/GDP is actually the US Government borrowing 5.5x their annual income.

Perhaps those are not the same people?

Bear in mind that printing currency is not without consequences either. It's not like each printed (and used) dollar is worth exactly as much as the previous one - otherwise hyperinflations could not happen.

I think that metaphor is useful for driving intuition about how it might not be a problem, if people aren't seeing that. I do worry about relying on it much beyond that. Households, companies, and governments all have balance sheets, but there are tremendous differences.