...But they also earn a transaction discount from the merchant. So in your case, they have taken the balance off the table and will still earn transaction discount fees from Sears on each of the "paltry" purchases you make to keep it open whil PIF.
...I think that rates are showing us the fear lenders have in "unsecured" revolving credit and are pricing it according to their fears and recourse. As unemployment approaches 10%, housing still unrecovered and the general financial status of the big picture, many lenders don't want to lend unless the profit is high and risk low. In your case, great, long established credit means lower risk, and with rate hike they hope to profit.
It's okay with us that they will still earn the trans discount fees. The purchases will be only to keep the card open and purchase amounts *will* be paltry. We've thought long about all that's going on and how it does or might yet affect us. It's possible they'll close the account because of so little usage - just when we want to go mortgage shopping, for instance. His Amex and my cards are open for future, well...who knows what?
But we've also taken a few deep breaths and reminded ourselves of all that we've so far been through in life, individually and as a team. Long term stuff, some of it, that will kill the psyche if you let it, not to mention strain health to the limit. Anyway, it's that kind of remembering that pretty much has led us to decide to not be afraid for our "financial future." If all of our cards get terrible rate hikes, if all our CLs drop down to bare minimums or, worse, the cards get closed, if we don't get our hoped for reasonable mortgage, if our pensions disappear...we'll still be here. A lot poorer to be sure, scratching our heads while deciding what to do next. But we'll be here, just like before. We just refuse to give in to the fear they'd like us all to feel and their increasingly outrageous demands.
Yes, you're right about the rates being tied into their fear. And they do have a right to have their own fear. After all, starting with the mid-nineties too many of us came to believe we really could have our cake and eat it, too. That we, also, could live lives almost like celebrities. Plus, too many who'd previously had problems paying the piper took advantage of the freely available credit of the times. But good or poor credit risk, none of us asked for the glut of corporate greed which led to wage cuts, benefit cuts, union busting and ultimately to millions out of work, and later millions of foreclosures.
I can't begin to debate, with intelligence, the pros/cons of all the bailouts we as citizens have been forced to swallow for the sake of preventing a "system collapse." But I don't need a master's degree in business to know that as long as millions of people remain unemployed and can't get work that pays comparably to what they earlier earned, or worry for the stability of their current jobs, as long as mortgage rates keep rising, as long as CCCs will have freedom to rate jack (and the new laws won't stop them) and create new fees - amidst *all of this* - the games they are playing on us WILL come back to haunt them. And *their* jobs and benefits, and *their* mortgages, and *their* ability to pay their pipers. The wheel of life keeps turning, as I see it. If you're on the bottom of the ferris wheel you're bound at some point to go up. If you're sitting at the top, be prepared to eventually take a fall. And won't they deserve all that comes when it does.
Sorry for the meandering and dime's worth of philosophizing.
As for getting your Rooms To Go account, sounds good to me. 
Furniture shopping is one of my favorite pastimes.
Thanks, txjohn, for an informative and thought inducing post.
