Big corporations giving people free money sound kinda unbelievable, don't you think? They must actually make money on card holders for this to be profitable. The obvious way is that some people will overdraw sooner or later, the other is that people with credit cards simply tend to spend more (some say about 10-15%). The average credit card debt in the USA is more that 6000$.
The "average credit card debt" is a bit difficult to really measure. That isn't necessarily the amount of interest bearing credit card debt which IMO is the real concern.
I've have some credit card debt, none of it carries any interest. When I buy appliances or furniture I usually take the interest free financing despite having the ability to pay. Why pay a few grand today when you can spread that out interest free for 2 years and let that value appreciate? I would have lost out on tons of money if I had sold investments up front to buy those goods. So instead of getting rid of all that money a year ago, I got 30% gains in the market.
