Let me explain a few things...I retired at 50, I am a real estate developer, I live in/own a 12,000 square foot house, own 15 rental houses and have my name in the land records of this county for very near 1000 acres. I have never borrowed money to buy a vehicle and I have not had a mortgage for the last 22 years. I own quite a bit of land in an adjacent state as well. I do have some problems, like the rising cost of building materials, but you can safely bet credit cards are not one of them.
Now with that behind us....you don't seem to be able to come to terms with answers because it's not what you want to hear. I will say this one last time and leave it to you to try and figure out...or not. This is "cut in stone" about all business; business is there to make money, period, end of story. Business does not "make" money by giving it away. They make it by having their customers believe they are getting something. That something, whatever it is DOES NOT COME FROM OR AT THE EXPENSE OF THE BUSINESS...it comes from customers. The increase in profit margin that allows them to "give" may be generated from higher prices as some have suggested and it may also come from the general way in which they profit to begin with. In this case it is both. Credit card companies bait their customers with certain incentives. Lower interest, consolidate debt for lower payments, "free" bonus points for using it more. "BAIT". Here comes the switch, you might not have gotten to this point yet, for your sake I hope you don't, but eventually the customer slips up. he buys outside or "above his league" as you claim I do. And they got you. Now customer is paying high interest, minimum payments and are committed to long terms. Lenders want you locked up in debt so you just keep on paying. There are far more people in this boat than those that haven't "gone too far" or "over the edge" yet. That is where the high profit comes in. You are fine, doesn't affect you, you pay it on time and unlike you accuse me of you don't go too far. Don't affect you??? back up...they also raise the prices across the board to cover the merchants having to pay the credit card fees. Consumer card holders are not the only ones banged on by the credit company...yep, you guessed it, Wal-Mart gets slammed for a percentage of the charge too. Who pays that??? Well, I'll leave it to you to try and figure out this time.
As a businessman, I can assure you when you come to me to have that custom dream home built I am going to tell you all about the quality and how many we build a year...why the parcel of land I have is just what you need and what a good deal it is. How I am going pass the savings on to you. You will, like all of my customers, be very happy. What I wont ruin it with is how ALL and I mean every last one of the costs will be passed along to you at a profit to me. Credit cards to houses, cars to guns and ammo...welcome to the real world of capitalism.