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Personal Finance

Credit card debt hit a record high. Here’s one way to pay it down.

Zero-percent interest balance transfer offers are plentiful, and while helpful, they do have cons.

Advice by
Columnist
February 22, 2023 at 7:00 a.m. EST
American households racked up $986 billion in credit card debt the last three months of 2022, a record high, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. (Elise Amendola/AP)
5 min

It was inevitable.

Although inflation is easing, many Americans are struggling and have turned to credit cards to bridge the gap between their earnings and higher expenses.

Credit card balances jumped to $986 billion in the fourth quarter of 2022, surpassing the pre-pandemic high of $927 billion, according to new data on household debt from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.