I knew it had to end some­time.  It was 2006, gas prices had peaked above $3.00, and I was laugh­ing each time I left the sta­tion.  It was partly due to my car get­ting over 30MPG, but mostly because of my credit card (here’s a link, but I am no longer rec­om­mend­ing this card).  My Citibank Div­i­dend Rewards card earned me 5% cash back on gaso­line and gro­ceries, which meant I was essen­tially get­ting 15 cents off each gal­lon of gas. Once I earned over fifty dol­lars, I sim­ply requested a check from their web­site, and reim­burse­ment arrived at my door in under 7 busi­ness days.  Unfor­tu­nately, as gas prices con­tin­ued to rise to over four dol­lars a gal­lon, Citibank cut their rewards pack­age from 5% to 2%.  They recently cut it again to 1%, elim­i­nat­ing any advan­tages to using the card, and prompt­ing my search for a new one.  The credit card mar­ket is no longer the idyllic consumer-favorable environ­ment it used to be. This doesn’t mean you can’t find an awe­some rewards plan, you just have to work a lit­tle harder for it.

Car­ry­ing a Bal­ance = No Rewards

For some peo­ple, credit cards result in more dam­age than good. Stud­ies have shown the aver­age col­lege grad­u­ate has thou­sands of dol­lars in credit card debt, and these people are the academically-superior minor­ity! A credit card may serve well as a means of short-term credit in emer­gen­cies, but it should never be used reg­u­larly for this pur­pose, and it should be a per­sonal finan­cial goal to pre­vent these emer­gen­cies from hap­pen­ing. Still, there are a few advan­tages to credit cards that work exclu­sively in your favor:

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