When your phone is ringing off the hook day and night and you are afraid to get the mail it can make you think that credit cards are the worse invention ever in the history of the planet!  The ease in which credit card debt can consume your life is frightening!  It often occurs so rapidly that you are left wondering what hit you and how you got to that point.  Let’s not be too hasty when blaming the credit companies!

Credit cards are not inherently evil!  I know you may disagree, but sorry the truth hurts sometimes!  The reality is that credit cards can actually enhance your life if used correctly.  This is the tough part to hear, albeit the truth.  The problems start to arise as we the consumers allow instant gratification to take precedence over common sense.

Credit cards first came to be back in the 1920’s by hotel chains and oil companies. In 1946 Flatbush National Bank in Brooklyn created the charge-it program for its customers.  But the real popularity came about in 1950 when Frank McNamara invented the Diners Club card.  Frank was unable to pay for his meal one evening and decided that would never happen again! 

From there the popularity of the credit card has surpassed any expectations.  Although originally intended to be used as an advance on your weekly pay, therefore being paid off as soon as you received your pay check, they have taken on a new meaning.  Today they are used often without any consideration of how the bill will be paid or when!  It is the human need for instant gratification that has taken hold.  As a direct result, credit companies are now making billions each year on interest charged to their card holders.

Of course we could blame the credit companies for charging so much in interest and keeping us in debt, but isn’t the reality that we stopped using common sense when pulling out our credit cards?  The government has stepped in and will be putting limitation on the amount of interest and finance charges these credit giants can charge us, the innocent consumers which will help millions in the future!  However, I wonder if it will only increase how often we pull those little cards out in an effort to have the things we most desire and can’t afford!

In 2002 the total U.S. credit card debt was $60 billion however today it is said to be $1.7 Trillion dollars!  What does this tell us?   Yes, the incredible high interest rates we are charged are bad, but don’t we have to also realize and accept that our own choices in how to use our credit cards can be blamed as well?

Credit cards can help us if we use them when we NEED them and pay them off when the bill arrives, as they were originally intended!  So the answer is Yes credit cards can be a good thing, but restraint, common sense and responsibility have to accompany those cards!

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