Rewards Credit Cards: The New Black Lung

It appears we’ve collectively traded the dusty, subterranean dangers of early 20th-century resource extraction for a more refined, yet equally insidious, form of self-immolation: the rewards credit card. While our predecessors faced literal cave-ins, we now navigate the treacherous chasms of minimum payments and opaque points systems, digital pickaxes clutched firmly. The promise of a free flight to nowhere, or perhaps a toaster, dangles precariously, much like the company scrip that kept generations beholden to the mine owner.

One truly must marvel at the ingenuity of a system that convinces legions to engage in such meticulous, often unpaid, labor for the benefit of multinational financial conglomerates. We track spending, strategize category bonuses, and pore over terms and conditions with the dedication of a prospector, only to find our most valuable "ore" — our purchasing power — siphoned off by interest rates that would make a robber baron blush. It’s a beautifully perverse ballet, where the consumer dances precariously close to the cliff edge of consumer debt, all for the fleeting illusion of a discounted holiday or, heaven forbid, 'lounge access.' The new silicosis, it seems, is simply the slow, suffocating realization that the house always wins.