Is Credit-Card Debt Out of Control?
Balances are on the rise, but defaults are still low.
A dollar sign followed by 13 digits tends to swivel heads. So credit card research site CardHub’s recent prediction that U.S. credit card holders will carry roughly $1 trillion in outstanding balances by the end of the year raises questions about how consumers are faring as debt levels grow. CardHub, which issued the forecast based on data from the Federal Reserve, warns that consumers may be on the path to spending beyond their means—a return to the bad habits that predated the 2007–08 financial crisis. Credit card balances recently sat at about $885.4 billion, by CardHub’s reading of the latest quarterly figures, compared with $832.5 billion a year earlier.
Finally, a look at other consumer debt provides some context. Credit card debt, higher than both auto loan balances and student loans in 2009, is now below both of those categories. Auto loan debt has reached $1.1 trillion, according to recent quarterly data from the New York Fed, although delinquencies still are a relatively manageable 3.5%. More worrisome is student loan debt, at $1.26 trillion. That’s a $69 billion increase from mid 2015, and the debt carries a 90-day delinquency rate of 11.1%, up from 8.5% at the end of 2011.
