[morgante]

> I actually find this to be a huge moral gray area; the reason that Visa, Discover, and MasterCard can afford to pay out handsome rewards is partly because of the financially illiterate charging more to their credit cards than they can afford to pay off

That's entirely false. The credit card business model (including rewards) does not depend on debt. Rewards are a fee passed from the merchant to the consumer via the credit card.

As you pointed out, American Express doesn't depend on this at all. Most of their best cards aren't even credit cards.

Also, if credit companies love debtors so much that their business depends on it, why do they court people with good credit so aggressively?