Credit cards have only recently become a mysterious boogeyman for me, but they haven’t always been. At one point in time I was quite excited for the day I got a credit card. I saw myself like the young beautiful women in the shows and movies that I had watched going from store to store swiping this piece of plastic and walking out of a mall with bags of clothes, shoes, and other goodies. In other words I believed that credit cards were free money to spend however I wanted with no consequences to suffer from.
This of course couldn’t be further from the truth.
I’m so glad that I know better now, but as I just applied for my first credit card I’m not afraid to admit that I am terrified to start using one for many reasons. First of all, I didn’t know how they worked and second of all, growing up watching millenials accumulate hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt and be declared a generation worse off than their parents has made me extremely debt averse and cautious about how I approach my finances.
This is apparently a very valid fear. On average, Americans carry $6,194 in credit card debt and collectively had $930 billion in debt in the final quarter of 2019. Of course you don’t need to be aware of these statistics to be well and truly afraid for your money. From Instagram…
