PBS FRONTLINE: The Secret History of the Credit Card (2004)

Name: PBS FRONTLINE: The Secret History of the Credit Card (2004)
Uploaded: 2009-05-29T15:59:00
Duration: 56 min

The average American family today carries 8 credit cards. Credit card debt and personal bankruptcies are now at an all time high. With no legal limit on the amount of interest or fees that can be charged, credit cards have become the most profitable sector of the American banking industry: more than $30 billion in profits last year alone. FRONTLINE examines how the credit card industry became so pervasive, so lucrative, and so powerful.

IF YOU'RE EXPERIENCING PROBLEMS WITH THE VIDEO ABOVE, WATCH THE FILM FOR FREE AT THE OFFICIAL PBS WEBSITE

Rate this video

Added by Films For Action

Economics

We Talked To Real Swing Voters: What They Told Us Will Shock You.

Is Europe Turning Fascist?

Revolution Now! with Peter Joseph | Ep #50 | July 6th 2024

Worker Democracy

The Truth About Trumponomics | Robert Reich

Closer to Home: Voices of Hope in a Time of Crisis (2024)

The Power of Local: Community Solutions to Our Global Crisis (2024)

How Capitalism Enslaved Us All | Grace Blakeley

Rev. Dr. William Barber - “White Poverty” & Poor People’s Campaign March | The Daily Show

Works for All: Cincinnati’s Co-Op Economy (2023) (trailer)

Inverted Totalitarianism (2024)

Power 2 the People (2013)

Living Without: How Much is Enough?

We Went To Puerto Rico: The Inequality We Saw Will Shock You

Why Social Democracy Isn't Good Enough

Billionaires are Pillaging America. How Do We Fight Back? | The Chris Hedges Report

The Rules of the Game Must Change | Yanis Varoufakis

In The Eye Of The Storm: The Political Odyssey Of Yanis Varoufakis (2024)

It's Basic (trailer)

AI Riots vs "Moore's Law for Everything" by Sam Altman

How the United States RIGGED the Global Economy

America Could Be a Utopia

Stop Being a Climate Change Doomer

Richard Wolff: How You Are Being Exploited

How do we get to UBI and Post-Labor Economics? Decentralized Ownership: the New Social Contract!

How Racism Harms White Americans (2013) (trailer)

Complicit: The Dark Realities of China's Electronics Industry (2017)

Your Amazon Returns Are Thrown in the TRASH

Why Inequality Is On The Rise

HeadSpin! Rewrite the Rules of the Money Game (2023)

How the US Property Tax System Robs The Poor to Pay For The Wealthy

Why Capitalism Loves Fossil Fuels

Elements of Mutual Aid: Experiments Toward Liberation (trailer)

Boomerang: Empire and Britain's Economy (2023)

America Lost (2019)

Watch On Demand

Reflection: A Walk with Water (2022)

Ecosophia: Ecological Wisdom (2024)

Harambe (2023)

Israelism (2023)

Psychedelia: The History and Science of Mystical Experience (2021)

No Small Matter (2019) (trailer)

Voices of Transition (2012)

Class Dismissed: A Film About Learning Outside Of The Classroom (2015)

Spiritually Incorrect (2020)

Bullied (2019)

Madagasikara (2020)

You Can't Evict An Idea - Occupy London On Film (2018)

The Man Card: White Male Identity Politics from Nixon to Trump (2020)

Tomorrow: All Over the Globe, Solutions Already Exist (US-Only) (2015)

Make Me A Man (2021)

Documentaries about Living the Change

A Simpler Way: Crisis as Opportunity (2016)

Wetheuncivilised, A Life Story (2017)

Living the Change: Inspiring Stories for a Sustainable Future (2018)

Fools & Dreamers: Regenerating a Native Forest (2019)

Occupy Love (2013)

Not Business As Usual (2014)

Prout: Economic Democracy in Practice (2004)

Creating Prosperous Communities: Examples of Small-Scale Cooperatives in Maleny (2002)

In Transition 2.0: A Story of Resilience & Hope in Extraordinary Times (2012)

Tomorrow: All Over the Globe, Solutions Already Exist (US-Only) (2015)

Class Dismissed: A Film About Learning Outside Of The Classroom (2015)

A Passion For Sustainability (2008)

Inhabit: A Permaculture Perspective (2015)

Alan Watts: What If Money Was No Object?

A New Story for Humanity: Change the Story, Change the World (2016) (trailer)

Within Reach: Journey to Find Sustainable Community (2013)

Self-Taught: Life Stories From Self-Directed Learners (2019)

Voices of Transition (2012)

Trending Articles

The Top 250 Documentaries We Can Use Change the World

Films For Action

Revolution and American Indians: “Marxism is as Alien to My Culture as Capitalism”

Russell Means

The Top 100 Documentaries We Can Use to Change the World

Films For Action

Cancel the Apocalypse: Here Are 41 Documentaries to Help Unlock the Good Ending

Films For Action

Nonviolence Is a Light of Possibility in Times Like This: on the Current Escalation in Israel and Palestine

Sabine Lichtenfels, A’ida al-Shibli, Uri Ayalon & Martin Winiecki

John Lennon's "Imagine," Made Into a Comic Strip

John Lennon. Art by Pablo Stanley

The White Man in That Photo

Riccardo Gazzaniga

Your Lifestyle Has Already Been Designed (The Real Reason For The Forty-Hour Workweek)

David Cain

Comic: If Bart Simpson and Chris Griffin Went to Couples Therapy

Panic Volkushka

Building Real Democracy in the Digital Era

Birgitta Jonsdottir

Market Fundamentalism Is Incompatible with Democracy and Leading Us Towards Fascism

Peter Joseph

The Top 10 Documentaries About the Israel / Palestine Conflict

Tim Hjersted

Why Advocates of Freed Markets Should Embrace "Anti-Capitalism"

Gary Chartier

Names and Locations of the Top 100 People Killing the Planet

Jordan Engel

10 Quotes From an Oglala Lakota Chief That Will Make You Question Everything About Our Society

Wisdom Pills

How Swedes and Norwegians Broke the Power of the ‘1 Percent’

George Lakey

42 Ways to Build a Liberated Society Beyond Capitalism

22 Documentaries That Tell the Truth About How Government Really Works

Tim Hjersted

15 Easy Things You Can Do to Help When You Feel Like Shit

Maritsa Patrinos

Bosom Buddies: A Photo History of Male Affection

Brett & Kate Mckay

To My Liberal Friends Who Support Israel's War: This Is Not What Defense Looks Like

Tim Hjersted

90 Inspiring, Visionary Films That Will Change How You See the World in Profound Ways

Tim Hjersted

Israel Hit Gaza Strip With the Equivalent of Two Nuclear Bombs

Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor

Guide to Building Thriving, Resilient Communities

Humanity is NOT the Problem. A Cultural Paradigm Based on Domination Is.

"We" Are Not Humanity: A Refutation of the "Humanity is a Virus" Thesis

Friendly Reminder: Humans Are Not a Virus - the Virus Is a Cultural Ideology

Beyond Civilization: Humanity's Next Great Adventure

Seeing Wetiko: on Capitalism, Mind Viruses, and Antidotes for a World in Transition

Engines of Domination: Political Power & The Human Emergency - Director's Cut (2018)

Films about Localization - the Solution to Globalization and Destructive, Infinite-Growth Economics

Planet Local: A Quiet Revolution (2022)

The Economics of Happiness (2011)

Bioregional Living: A Permaculture Guide to Food and Energy Independence | Andrew Faust (2020)

The Movement for Localization Is Growing Rapidly, Worldwide

LOCAL: A Story Of Hope

World Localization Day 2020 (Short Version) Be Part of this Inspirational Movement for Change!

Planet Local: A 7-Part Film Series about the Regenerative Food Movement

Coming Home: The Reinvention of the Local Economy (2009)

Locally Abundant (2012)

The Economics of Happiness (Abridged Version)

Helena Norberg-Hodge: An Overview of Localization

Local Futures: Beyond the Monoculture (1998)

Local Living Economies - Protecting What We Love

Subscribe for $5/mo to Watch over 50 Patron-Exclusive Films

The Myth of the Liberal Media: The Propaganda Model of News (1997)

Constructing Public Opinion: How Politicians & the Media Misrepresent the Public (2001)

A Bold Peace: Costa Rica's Path of Demilitarization (2016)

War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death (2007)

The Occupation of the American Mind: Israel's Public Relations War in the United States (2016)

Dysfunctional Societies: How Equality Makes Societies Stronger (2015)

The Third Harmony: Nonviolence and the New Story of Human Nature (2020)

We Are Many (2020)

The Great Disconnect (2020)

Consuming Kids: The Commercialization of Childhood (2008)

A Convenient Truth: Urban Solutions from Curitiba, Brazil (2006)

Peace, Propaganda, & The Promised Land: US Media & the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (2003)

Inhabit: A Permaculture Perspective (2015)

Spiritually Incorrect (2020)

Inhabitants: Indigenous Perspectives On Restoring Our World (2021)

Shift Change: True Stories of Dignified Jobs in Democratic Workplaces (2013)

Invisible Hand: Who Will Speak For Nature? (2020)

The Nature of Cities (2010)

Biophilic Design: The Architecture of Life (2011)

School Circles: Democratic Schools in the Netherlands (2018)

The Next American Revolution: Beyond Corporate Capitalism & State Socialism (2013)

The New Economics 101: True Wealth in the New Economy (2013)

Overload: America's Toxic Love Story (2019)

Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear & the Selling of American Empire (2004)

Advertising & The End of The World (1997)

The Wisdom To Survive (2014)

The Sequel: What Will Follow Our Troubled Civilisation? (2020)

A Quest For Meaning (2017)

GIFT: The Imagination Creates the Future (2018)

Dancing With The Cannibal Giant: New Stories for the Great Transition (2019)

Accidental Anarchist (2017)

Within Reach: Journey to Find Sustainable Community (2013)

Affluenza (1997)

Freedom Ahead: Democracy Does Not Offer Freedom, Nature Does (2012)

Become a Patron. Support Films For Action.

For $5 a month, you'll gain access to over 50 patron-exclusive documentaries while keeping us ad-free and financially independent. We need 350 more Patrons to grow our team in 2024.

Subscribe | Explore the 50+ Patron Films

Our 6000+ video library is 99% free, ad-free, and entirely community-funded thanks to our patrons!

Availability note:
We have lots of films in our library that are Pay-Per-View only, which aren't available by becoming a Subscriber.
If you're subscribing to watch a particular film, please check the film's page for access details. Patron Films have this button below the video:

Date Added
Views
Length	min
Topics