What’s the deal with credit card debt?

By Mike Pierce | September 24, 2025

Earlier this month, we published a poll with our friends at Groundwork Collaborative, conducted by Data for Progress, that offered some high-level insights on the debts Americans owe and the public demand for government action in response. There are a few stories here, each of which we’ll unpack in future posts over the coming weeks, but we’re starting today with one of the most important: we found that government action to cap credit card interest rates is wildly popular. 

By a jaw-dropping 8-to-1 margin, Americans of all political parties, spanning age, gender, race, and education, want government action to cap credit card interest rates. Capping credit card interest rates is more popular than Santa Claus.

If owing credit card debt feels more expensive, that’s because it is more expensive. Credit card banks (companies like Capital One and American Express) are charging families the highest interest rates ever recorded. According to a CFPB analysis in 2024, “over the last 10 years, average APR on credit cards assessed interest have almost doubled from 12.9 percent in late 2013 to 22.8 percent in 2023—the highest level recorded since the Federal Reserve began collecting this data in 1994.”

As a result, families are paying credit card banks a huge amount of money each year. In a paper released a few weeks ago, Brian Shearer, a researcher at Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator (and a Protect Borrowers alum), dug deep into the specific proposals to cap credit card interest rates, finding that families would save $100 billion per year with a 10 percent rate cap. Shearer also takes the two most common credit card lobbyists’ talking points head on—explaining that capping credit card interest rates will not restrict most Americans’ access to credit or drive credit card companies to roll back expansive loyalty programs.

Savings and Other Effects of Rate Caps on the Credit Card Market

SOURCE: Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator

According to the New York Fed, Americans owe $1.21 trillion in aggregate credit card debt, and more than 12 percent of this debt is 90 days past due or more—the high water mark for distress since the peak of the Great Recession. Our poll offers a baseline on the state of Americans’ credit card debts, breaking down what this really looks like for working families:

• Credit card debt is nearly universal. Roughly 3-in-4 voters (73 percent) currently owe credit card debt or have had credit card debt in the past. Respondents report debts consistently across party affiliation, age, race, gender, and education. Credit card debt is as American as apple pie. 

• Most people who owe credit card debt owe a little, but many owe a lot. More than half of voters owe credit card debt right now, with the largest share (3-in-10 voters) reporting debts of $5,000 or less. However, nearly a quarter of voters (24 percent) owe more than $5,000 and fully 1-in-10 (11 percent) owe $15,000 or more.

• Many people who owe credit card debt expect to be in debt for a long time. Half of voters who owe credit card debt expect to be in debt for a year or longer, and 1-in-7 (15 percent) say they will need 5 years or more to pay off their credit card debt. These are borrowers who have revolving credit card balances and are directly affected by historically high credit card interest rates.

• People are using other kinds of debt to keep up with payments on their credit cards. Among the 29 percent of voters who use Buy Now Pay Later credit, more than 1-in-3 (36 percent) have taken out a Buy Now Pay Later loan to make a payment on another debt, like a credit card or a car loan. Alarmingly, 1-in-5 Buy Now Pay Later users report that they use these loans to make payments on other debts every month.

A Campaign Pledge Broken

The depth and distribution of Americans’ credit card debts put the broad popular support for government action to cap credit card interest rates into context—the experience of both owing and revolving a balance on a credit card debt is broadly shared. As the cost of living continues to climb, more Americans are using debt to pay for day-to-day living expenses, likely growing the pool of families exposed to these sky-high rates. Of course voters demand action—they understand that lawmakers can help them, but are choosing not to act.

SOURCE: Protect Borrowers, Groundwork Collaborative, Data for Progress Poll

Candidate Trump understood the politics of credit card debt—campaigning on a promise to cap credit card interest rates at 10 percent. Earlier this year, a pair of bipartisan bills was introduced in the House and Senate, sponsored by Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Anna Paulina Luna in the House, and Senators Bernie Sanders and Josh Hawley in the Senate. These proposals would deliver on candidate Trump’s campaign promise to lower credit card interest rates for working families. 

Unfortunately, President Trump appears ready to add this to his growing list of broken campaign promises on the economy. Since taking office, the Trump Administration has sided with the credit card banks, rolling back rules that would have lowered credit card late fees for everyone. It handed out corporate pardons to big banks and credit card companies. It also allowed Capital One to acquire Discover, creating the largest subprime credit card company in history. 

American families need lawmakers and President Trump to keep their promises and require credit card companies to lower sky-high interest rates. This isn’t just good economic policy, it’s popular politics. 

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Mike Pierce is the Executive Director of Protect Borrowers.

This blog was also published on In Debt, a Protect Borrowers Substack.