Children, don't spend money you don't have.

It's saturday morning. I'm in my 'get shit done' uniform (headband, yoga pants + tshirt, glasses, face masque), armed with my TI-83 calculator...ready to do some budgeting & financial planning. On this particular morning, I have an extra spring in my step due to the fact that I just paid off all of my outstanding cedit cards.

This is when I realize that credit cards and the lending industry are both pretty trashy. I've included statistics below to support this piont.

• The credit card industry mailed over 6 billion credit card offers in 2005, an average of 6 offers per household per month
• Late fee income alone totaled over $11 billion in 2005
• 78% of American households were deemed creditworthy by the credit card industry in 2004
• With its acquisition of MBNA, Bank of America became the nation’s largest credit card issuer in 2006, followed by Chase and Citi.
• There were 574 million Visa and MasterCard accounts in the U.S in 2004
• Average household credit card debt has increased 167% between 1990 and 2004
• The average interest rate paid on credit cards was approximately 14.54% in 2005
• The rate of personal savings in the United States dipped below 0% for the first time since the great depression in 2005, hitting negative .5%
• Approximately 23 million households made only minimum payments in 2005
• 2.39 million U.S. households filed for bankruptcy in 2005, a 12.8% increase over 2004
• The average credit card balance in 2005 would require over 13 years to pay off if only making minimum payments of 4% at an average interest rate of 14%
• As of 2004, the number one cause of divorce is financial stress
• In 2004, 83% of undergraduate college students had at least one credit card in their name with an average outstanding balance of over $2,300
• 32% of students had 4 or more credit cards in 2004
• In 2005, 65% of teens failed a financial literacy test according to the JumpStart Coalition

Remember: Don't spend money you don't have!