That’s a Lot of Zeros

Wow. According to CardTrak, consumers “will likely rack up more than $85 billion in holiday sales on VISA, MasterCard, American Express and Discover credit cards” this year. That’s $85,000,000,000 — up 11% over 2005. Even at a (randomly chosen, unrealistically low) average annual percentage rate of 3%, that means the credit card companies would be earning 2.5 billion dollars in interest alone. (Which isn’t including late fees, over-limit charges, people who don’t pay their balance off within a year, people whose interest rates are greater than 3%, etc.) At 19% it would climb to over $16 billion. Is it any wonder there are so many credit card companies after your money? Be your credit card company’s worst customer: pay your balance in full each month, or don’t charge at all.