@daylove wrote:You can live without CC...I lived without for long time I just had a Western Union Prepaid, which btw is the best card I have ever used...most guys who love CC are those who live beyond their means..I do have regular cards now but I prefer to pay with cash..and cash is still king. BTW, we do not need FICO scores either if you pay in cash nothing matter...
Cash is a very good thing 
but if you learn the proper use of CC's (which took me more decades than I care to admit) they can save and make you money.
I'll give a recent example. I paid for some dental work for my wife with my Discover card. I got a 2% discount for paying with a CC to begin with plus I got cash back on the transaction. In total I paid $150 less than what paying strictly cash would have been.
But admittedly you have to work out all the details ahead of time to make sure you don't make any mistakes that will cost you interest.
From a BK years ago to:
EX - 3/11 pulled by lender- 835, EQ - 2/11-816, TU - 2/11-782
"Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem".
@daylove wrote:You can live without CC...I lived without for long time I just had a Western Union Prepaid, which btw is the best card I have ever used...most guys who love CC are those who live beyond their means..I do have regular cards now but I prefer to pay with cash..and cash is still king. BTW, we do not need FICO scores either if you pay in cash nothing matter...
Thumbs up to you for being able to buy a house with cash. 
And I lived without CC's for a long time, too. But I greatly prefer CC's to cash, because I milk them for rewards, and I've used the consumer protections that they provide more than once, and I like the convenience of paying my bills all at the same time.
Which I do monthly, btw, and in full.
I read about debt and self-esteem the other day. Some get a boost from more spending; it's like power and control have been restored, so you feel better. To others, there's nothing quite like being debt-free, which is useful to experience at times.
If then for the fun of it you google self-esteem and something like gossip, one finds that people with high of the former feel little need to do any of the latter, which underlines that spending money can be like a self-esteem addiction.
This ties in with the article's Adam Baker saying that credit cards "actually encourage us to live a lifestyle that is not in line with where we want to be." While I don't have any debt to catapult me into overreacting, he's essentially right.
I'll keep the cards that I have, including a recent second Amex. The consumer protections are necessary. I certainly enjoy the rewards too, but the catch is the direct correlation between spending and the cashback/points. 
