Make Loan Sharks Great Again? Why a 10% Credit Card Cap Backfires

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At first glance, a 10% cap on credit card interest rates sounds like a win for consumers. Who wouldn’t want relief from 20–30% APRs? But dig one layer deeper, and this proposal turns from populist applause line into an economic mess that would hurt the very people it claims to help.
In this episode, Chris explains how the credit card industry actually works—who really charges interest, where swipe fees go, and why Visa, Mastercard, and AmEx aren’t the villains they’re made out to be. Spoiler: banks take the risk, banks charge the interest, and credit cards are largely unsecured, non-recourse loans.
Cap rates at 10%, and banks won’t suddenly become generous—they’ll pull credit, cancel cards, jack up fees, or require cash collateral. Young workers, lower-credit borrowers, and anyone new to the system get squeezed out first. That’s how credit rationing works, every time.
Chris breaks down why this idea is straight out of the price-control playbook, why it’s midterm political theater, and why it can’t be enforced without blowing up access to credit across the country.
Misusing credit cards is a real problem—but government-mandated rate caps won’t fix it. They’ll just make credit scarcer, more expensive in other ways, and far less accessible.