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High spending
Fri, Jan 04, 2008 The Straits Times
WHEN South Korea began encouraging credit card use in the late 1990s, companies set up kiosks on the streets and even issued cards to college students, luring them with cash gifts. While the country has only 23 million economically active people, the number of credit cards in use has surged from 42 million in 1998 to 105 million in 2002. The bubble burst a year later, when the number of defaulters soared by 41 per cent to 3.7 million. Some were driven to suicide.

In 2006, nearly half the 454 trillion won in private consumption in South Korea was settled with credit cards, one of the highest ratios in the world, government officials said.

Although South Korea ranked 34th in per capita income among countries in 2005, it was fifth in per capita credit card spending, according to the Bank of Korea, the country's central bank.

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