How much credit card debt is ‘normal'?
Many Americans know just how difficult it is to escape the credit card debt spiral.
Americans now owe a record $1.18 trillion on their credit cards, according to figures released this week by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
That sum could pay the annual wages of every public school teacher in the U.S. for about four-and-a-half years. And if you were to stack the amount in dollar bills, it would reach one-third of the way to the moon.
And more than 12 percent of all credit card debt was in serious delinquency, which means balances are at least 90 days overdue, marking a 13-year high.
Total credit card debt has ballooned by 53 percent in just four years since the start of 2021, The Independent 's analysis finds, as Americans struggled against inflationary pressures, an unaffordable housing market, and impacts from the Covid-19 pandemic.
According to a recent report by TransUnion, one of the three largest U.S. consumer credit reporting agencies, the average credit card debt per American in March was $6,371.
That figure was marginally down from $6,455 the month prior, but still up $153 from the same period in 2024.
The average credit card APR, meaning the interest rate charge by the banks, for accounts with existing balances is 21.91 percent, almost doubling in the last decade.
That can mean customers are paying enormous amounts of interest, as well as their original debt. If you were to, say, pay off the standard $6,371 debt in $150 monthly installments, you'd end up paying back more than double what you owed, and it would take more than five and a half years to pay off the full amount.
While overall credit card balances fell marginally in the first quarter of 2025, Erica Sandberg, a personal finance expert for CardRates.com, told The Independent that Americans aren't yet safe from the debt monster.
'The good news is that we are already starting to see a decline in credit card debt,' Sandberg said. 'However, this doesn't mean that Americans are out of the woods. Student loan delinquencies are ramping up, and mortgage balances are higher.'
Credit card debt averages are weighted differently depending on the cardholder's age, according to analysis from Forbes.
Generation X, those aged 45 to 54, harbored the most debt, with average balances hitting $9,255.
Baby Boomers, aged 60 to 78, and Millennials, aged 28 to 43, are almost neck and neck with average credit card debt of $6,648 and $6,642, respectively. The Silent Generation, those aged 79 and older, had $3,375.
But it was Generation Z, aged 18 to 27, who were currently the lowest debt holders with average balances at $3,266.
In TransUnion's state-by-state breakdown, there is also a vast disparity between the regions which have the highest and lowest average credit card debt.
Alaskans have the highest average balance at $7,427 compared with Wisconsinites, who have the lowest average debt at $5,054, according to the report.
The District of Columbia had the second highest average credit card debt ($7,370), followed by Hawaii ($7,163), Maryland ($7,054) and Nevada ($7,062).
Following Wisconsin, Iowa had the second lowest average credit card debt ($5,140), with Kentucky ($5,350), West Virginia ($5,399), Indiana ($5,416) and Nebraska ($5,499).
For those who can afford to do so, paying off your statement balance in full each month means you can avoid interest charges entirely. But if others are ensnared by increasing balances, Sandberg revealed a strategy to make a great escape.
'My favorite strategy is this: Suspend charging. Don't add to your debt as you are in pay off mode,' she said. 'Analyze your budget to know the fixed sum you can send every month. Determine how much money you have to apply to your balances.
'You may want to add to your income or reduce spending, so you can free up as much cash as possible,' Sandberg concluded.
And it isn't just credit card debt that is spiking.
According to new data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, total household debt stood at $18.2 trillion, up by 2.9 percent from the same period last year.
Mortgage loans account for about two-thirds of total U.S. household debt, the figures show.
Non-mortgage debt stood at $5.4 trillion, spearheaded by outstanding balances on auto loans and student loans at $1.64 trillion and $1.63 trillion, respectively.
According to the latest figures from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in October last year, 100 million Americans owe $220 billion in medical debt.
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