You're Not Alone: Credit Card StatisticsMichael KnowlesDo you have any idea just how common credit cards are? Let's take a look at a few statistics from the USA.The average family carries a balance of between $5,000 and $8,000 on all their credit cards, depending on which figures you believe. Over $1,000 per family goes on interest every year. And that's just the average ? some people owe much more! Overall, Americans spend over $1 trillion every year on their credit cards, and owe more than $500 billion of it. If debt continues at the current rate, then one family in a hundred will be forced into bankruptcy. Over 90% of Americans' disposable incomes are spent paying back debts. Whatever happened to saving?Debt Costs Everyone MoneyLiterally billions of dollars are being used up on expenses that are only created because of the existence of the credit card industry. The weight of the calculations, administration and marketing needed to support the industry is immense ? the average American gets at least one credit card offer in the mail every day. That's before you take into account the burden bankruptcies put on the court system, and the cost to the government of providing subsidised debt counselling. You might also note that consumers with more debt have less to spend ? and when money isn't flowing, it hurts the economy. There are very few industries or people that aren't hurt by debt, at least in the long run.Debt is Much More Common Than It Used To BeIt's not so long ago that being in even a little debt was considered to be absolutely terrible. When you wanted something, you saved up for it, and bought it once you had enough money. If you had bad credit, you couldn't get a credit card at all. Go back fifty years and consumer debt figures were absurdly low, the same way they are today in most of the non-Western world. In the West, though, the art of saving seems to be a lost one ? almost no-one is saving enough for their retirement, and banks are having to offer ever-higher interest rates to get people to put money anywhere near a savings account. We have an 'I-want-it-now' consumer culture, and we're willing to pay more than we can afford to fund our lifestyles.Spending Isn't To BlameNow that I've said that, don't think that the reason you're in debt is that you haven't spent your money cautiously enough. According to statistics, it is very rare for people to get into debt because they spend their money frivolously. Far more people get buried in debt because they lose their job, or get sick ? they take out credit cards to pay for basic expenses, and fall into the interest trap. Their debt spirals out of control from just a few thousand dollars borrowed to pay for essentials. Most people have a reasonable sense of what they can afford, and won't go out and use credit cards to buy things that they wouldn't usually be able to pay for. The problem is simply a matter of people leaving their balances on credit cards for too long, not realising just how high the interest really is.Moving Debt Between Cards Can Save You MoneyIf you're like most people, you have plenty of credit cards, and you have stacks of offers for more. The credit card industry is so competitive that, whatever card you have, the chances are that somewhere out there is one that would be cheaper or better for you ? and you can change as often as you want!Take Up Teaser OffersTo try and get customers, credit cards are still offering massive discount rates when you transfer balances over to them. These 'teaser' rates will only last for a set period (check the terms and conditions), but they can still save you a lot of money ? especially if you switch to another card's teaser rate each time one ends. Yes, this does mean applying for a new card relatively often ? but if you do it online, you'll find it's quite painless. Is it really worth hundreds of dollars to save the trouble of applying for a new card? Just make sure that you follow the conditions set forth by the card company. If you make just one late payment they will sometimes raise your rate to a much higher rate. So be careful and read the fine print.Extend Your OffersYou might not even need to move to another card to get a teaser offer for longer. If you phone and ask, many lenders will extend the preferential rate for longer, in an effort to get you to stick around.Check the Small PrintYou might find that the 'low, low rate' only lasts a few months, and you might also find that it only applies to balance transfers, not new purchases. A common trap is for a card to allow you to transfer your balance of thousands at 0% APR, only to charge you 20% or more on anything new you buy with it. Of course, as soon as you ditch that card and move to the next, the new purchases become a balance transfer again. A more nasty thing you might find is that you're signing up to a minimum term to get the teaser offer ? they won't let you transfer your balance away again for a year, or even more. Avoid these cards like the plague.Keep Track of TimeYour card issuer isn't going to go out of their way to alert you when your teaser rate is over. Make sure you keep track: make a mark on the calendar. Months can go by far more quickly than you'd think, and missing the end of the teaser period by even a day will mean that you'll end up paying interest at the normal rate.Moving Around and Your Credit RatingMoving debt around between cards often affects your credit rating in an odd way. On the one hand, it shows that you could be an unprofitable customer ? after all, you change cards before they can make a profit from you. On the other hand, it also shows that you're likely to take up offers that you're sent, and companies tend to believe that they have a great strategy to keep you with them where others have failed. In other words, some companies will hate you for it, and some will love you. Bear in mind, though, that the longer you do it for, the fewer companies will want to send you their very best teaser rates.Copyright 2005 Michael Knowleswww.freedomisyoursonline.comYou may use this article on your website if you keep my copyright on it or you may link directly to my free blog reports page at http://www.freedomisyoursonline.com/wordpress
Want To Give Boost To Your Music? There Is A Way Out
Are you a budding music professional, trying to make a mark in life? Well, you would already have experienced the initial pains of trying to establish a foothold in the industry. It is not easy if you do not have a past back ground or support of the veterans in the field. You have to be on your own and carve out a niche for yourself. Let us learn a few of the important lessons about making a beginning in the field.
First things first. Always remember that your music has to reach out to people and not the other way round. Thus you have to make extra efforts, at least initially, so that people have access to your music. They should be able to notice your potential and abilities without much fuss. Is it possible to do so without having to spend a great deal? It is very much possible. Make your own music club. Perform in colleges and universities and above all use your greatest friend- the internet. If you want to strike the right chord, you must upload your music on various internet sites such as iTunes etc. This way people can experience and enjoy your music and, in fact, do their own music recording of your album without much effort.
Digital music sale is the new buzzword in the music industry. More and more people want to download music into their iPods and other players. This saves time and effort and is hugely convenient. So unless you have your music on music sites, you can never reach out at least to begin with. Remember that the challenge for you at this stage is to create hype, a buzz and an aura about your talent. It is better to have a digital music recording of your album and put it on the web for sale. Many of the budding talents have benefited by taking this route.
By allowing people to digitally download music, you touch their lives in so many ways. It is also possible to take this route so that people who have listened to your music elsewhere can have one address to look at to reach you. No need to store your albums at music stores. They may also be wary to give you a break at least initially. You will have to spend money in creating records and CDs and request these guys to give you a shelf in their stores. Instead just ask them to give you a chance to perform and have your music at websites allowing people free and easy access. Is it not a great way to boost your music sales?
A little publicity does not harm anybody - least of all a budding music professional. You have to create your own niche. Everyone has gone through the same grind. Your local radio station or even a night club disc jockey is a great friend to create a buzz about your music. Once people notice you, it is a self perpetuating cycle. Happy music sales!!!
The author loves music. Download some music software from the internet and start your own home recording studio. Learn from an online music dictionary.
Digitalization of Entertainment
Consumers have moved rapidly to adopting digital formats for consuming entertainment-related content. The most obvious example of this is music and video downloads, with Apple’s iTunes and You Tube as leading examples. Apple has sold more than one billion songs via its iTunes music store and it continues to demonstrate a spectacular rate of growth. Over 30,000,000 individuals have purchased an ipod portable music device, and tens of millions of other consumers use one of dozens of other portable devices to listen to music. Other platforms for listening to music are equally successful, and in the case of Microsoft’s Windows Media Player even more dominant with over 90,000,000 systems running the software globally. Real Networks Rhapsody, and Yahoo! Music represent other major entrants in this space. In addition to those companies selling licensed music downloads for a fee, peer-to-peer networks such as Limewire and Morpheus claim to have tens of millions of users sharing music and other files on a continual basis.
As consumers have become comfortable purchasing (and stealing) music online, they are now beginning to download other digital forms of entertainment, including music videos, short-subject films, television shows, and even full-length Hollywood pictures. Traditional media companies have recognized the opportunity to establish new revenue streams and leverage old assets by enabling consumers to download television programming for a fee, and the adoption rate appears to match the early days of music downloading. The increasing penetration of broadband connections (over 50 million homes in the US), advances in software that enables high-quality downloads, and content companies recognizing an enormous opportunity to distribute directly and inexpensively to consumers has created a tidal shift in the number of digital media assets available for download to computers, handheld devices, and even cell phones.
Companies such as YouTube are at the forefront of the intersection of video entertainment and the fragmentation of media due to the empowerment of the consumer. Hundreds of millions of videos are downloaded weekly from YouTube (as well as dozens of competitors), and a significant portion of those videos are not “professionally” produced. More importantly, new talent in various entertainment fields are being discovered through these distribution platforms and forever changing how entertainment is conceived, produced, distributed, and valued.