The Archives

Everything written by Allan Shampine on law, economics, and more

Assessing the Social Effects of the Use of Credit Cards

The GAO has a fairly extensive discussion of the costs and benefits of credit cards to merchants.  However, that discussion focuses on the individual benefits.  I would like to step back and put two of those benefits – increased merchant sales and fraud prevention costs – into the larger context that I discussed earlier. First, ... Assessing the Social Effects of the Use of Credit Cards

Credit Cards in Context: Framing the Discussion

Allan L. Shampine is a Vice President at Compass Lexecon in Chicago While the GAO report provides a useful summary of many of the issues being debated within the credit card community, the GAO’s mandate was, in some ways, rather narrow.  The GAO was asked to “review (1) how the fees merchants pay have changed ... Credit Cards in Context: Framing the Discussion