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While I think credit cards have great benefits (see stevenwei for an excellent summary), getting the card does have a consequence in my experience: every card

• bgruber 14y ago
  In the us, few cards besides AMEX have annual fees. The credit card companies make most of their money on people who fall behind on their payments and end up paying a ton of interest, and i would guess that annual fees aren't attractive to those customers. New college students are a prime example. While this sucks for the system as a whole, on an individual level it does mean that those of us who have a reliable income (or FU money) can use credit cards very differently. They provide convenience, consumer protection, usually some kind of 'reward' (travel points or such), and yes, a 30 day grace period in which you can do something else with your money though I usually don't think of it that way. In fact, from an individual standpoint the only reason I can think of to use a debit card rather than credit here is a complete lack of financial responsibility/will power.