Based on data from Transunion, residents of cities that host a major tech firm have low credit card debt. A new study from CardHub highlights that communities such as Cupertino and Mountainview, California, the headquarters of Apple and Google, have high numbers of residents with little to no credit card debt.
The new research from CardHub was published on January 6th, and involves determining the number of months required to pay off the average credit-card balances in 2,547 U.S. cities and the total cost of paying off the average balance (based on local incomes).
Of interest, the latest data shows that Americans have more than $900 billion in credit-card debt as of December 31, 2015, the highest total since 2007.
U.S. cities with lowest credit card debt
As noted above, several cities in Silicon Valley or nearby in Central California enjoy the lowest per capita debt levels among all cities in the country. Given the average compensation received by an employee of these tech firms, it is really not too surprising to learn that residents of these areas carry little consumer debt.
The city that has residents that will require the least time to fully pay off their credit card balances is Cupertino, California. Residents of Apple’s home city only owe an average of $4,703 on their credit cards, and it will only cost $309 dollars and take 10 months to fully pay off the average balance. Saratoga, CA came in second on CardHub’s 2016 list, with an average credit card debt of $6,794, and it will cost $613 take 14 months to pay off the average balance. Google’s home town Mountainview, CA was ranked third on the list, as residents only had an average credit card debt of $4,974, and it will cost $418 and take 15 months to pay down that debt.
U.S. cities with highest credit card debt
Residents of Kent, Ohio face a daunting credit card burden. At third to last on CardHub’s list, they owe an average of $5,103 on their credit cards, but given the small payments they can afford to make, it will cost an average of $9,063 and take an average of 220 months to pay off credit card debt. Powhatan, VA has the second highest credit card burden in the country relative to income, with an average of $5,988 per capita. Moreover, it will cost $11,782 and take 237 months to pay off the average credit card debt. In last place is College Station, Texas, were the average credit card debt is $5,601, and it will cost $25,221 and take 387 months to pay off. Note that the population of College Station is almost 90% students with very low incomes.
