available credit

Every day there is a stand in the subway manned by several young-ish attendants getting people to sign up for a credit card, offering a free gift (tupperware, alarm clocks, stuffed animals) in exchange for their information. The table is always crowded and it doesn't take much for people to get them to sign up for one. Seeing that I've passed this table at least twice a day, in one of the busiest parts of town, I'm positive that thousands of applications are turned in every day, if not tens of thousands considering Shanghai is a city of at least 14 million people.

Having my own experience with credit cards and the chaos that ensued, I get nervous thinking about the number of people who are "awarded" a line of credit every day in China, especially in the big cities that are enamored with the sparkles, glitter and sequins (tasteful ones, of course) of Western consumerism. Credit seems to have a good impression on Chinese consumers considering the number of labyrinthian shopping malls that exist in all directions from here. Of course credit doesn't end at the shopping mall, the ubiquitous Union Pay can be used to finance your extravagant wedding photos taken at the Great Wall, your sleek new luxury car or fine imported wines (did you know that they like to use mixers with wine here?). It's just like the states except in China where there are at least a billion more people, not to mention the severe income gap between urban and rural populations.

I don't want to give the impression that I think credit is a bad thing, I'm just worried about the increasingly available consumer credit in China, and everywhere else, has the potential to be a terrible thing!