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Credit Card Points Are a Transfer from the Broke to the Comfortable

29 points by willio58

by lyall

2 subcomments

You hear this argument pretty often, but it's not true.
Credit card companies do make a lot of money off of interest. But they also make a lot of money off of interchange fees.
Businesses want wealthy customers because they spend more money, so they're willing to pay a higher interchange fee to access those customers. Higher interchange fees mean card companies can offer better rewards, which in turn attract more wealthy customers to their cards.
So even if credit card debt was not a thing, it would still be incredibly profitable for card companies to sell access to their rich cardholder clientele, and to in turn provide rewards to those cardholders.

by variety8675

1 subcomments

Pay in full customers can be profitable through interchange fees alone, so I don't really follow how it is a wealth transfer

by SpicyLemonZest

2 subcomments

I don't disagree with anything the author is saying. But the corollary, which the article doesn't really acknowledge, is that reforms like credit card interest caps and the Credit Card Competition Act would substantially limit consumer access to credit. That's the argument that banks raise every time and why interest rate caps always die in committee.
If advocates want to team up with Dave Ramsay and say "that's right, credit cards are bad, we want them to be less available", perhaps things could change one day. I'd donate to that cause. If we keep pretending that we could have exactly the same system with lower interest rates, I don't think we'll ever get anywhere.

by dev_daftly

0 subcomment

The author couldn't even get through the first two sentences without being wrong. Credit card rewards are not funded by interest and this idea that credit card companies don't want you paying off your bill every month is retarded. The card issuer gets the majority of the interchange fee and makes a profit on every swipe even after accounting for rewards.

0 subcomment

by pixl97

0 subcomment

by applfanboysbgon

1 subcomments

It is jarring to read Claude talking like it uses credit cards or feels guilt over using reward points.

by B1FF_PSUVM

0 subcomment

Bullshit guilt-tripping logic. Just the 150 billion from "interchange" (merchant fees) would be enough reason to fund the 15 billion (estimated) rewards.
What next, supermarket coupons as a wealth transfer mechanism?