Sunday's Washington Post published an informative and disturbing article about how undergraduates are "majoring in plastic," relying heavily on credit cards to finance tuition and basic living expenses, such as food, gasoline and housing. The story reports on the incredibly aggressive marketing campaigns waged by credit card companies, which target students by staking out tables on college campuses and handing out a variety of freebies.

The article raises two interesting issues that suggest the need for significant policy changes in order to give young people a real chance at building solid financial futures. First, the article suggests the need for significant increases in low interest education financing. The article reports the results of a U.S. PIRG survey of 1500 students at 40 colleges in 14 states which recently found that 2 out of 3 students had a credit card, 55 percent of whom used their card to finance day-to-day expenses. Fifty-five percent charged their books and almost one quarter paid their tuition with a credit card. Freshmen who were not financially assisted by their parents had an average balance of $1,301; seniors had an average balance of $2,623.

With the average credit card interest rate in the United States hovering around 19 percent, forcing students to rely on credit cards to finance their college education seems like the worst policy decision imaginable, and the fact that it is so pervasive points to the need for a massive increase in low interest education financing. In the absence of this shift, students will be left digging themselves deep into debt, being forced to contend with the anxiety of rapidly accumulating debt and taking out second jobs, making it difficult to focus on education that they are paying so much for.

Second, the article spends some time considering whether 18 year olds are financially educated enough to select and use credit cards. The article quotes members of the credit card industry as saying that if 18 year olds are old enough to "die for their country," they are obviously old enough to select a credit card. The article then inexplicably goes on to suggest that these credit card companies should be praised for their efforts to provide students with a "financial education" so that they can make informed decisions about credit card usage.

The article notes the efforts of a handful of college campuses to include some financial education in their freshmen orientation programs but misses the fact that these efforts are tiny in proportion to the massive financial literacy effort that is necessary in order for young people to become truly informed consumers of financial products that are as complex and dangerous as many credit cards.

To me, the narratives and statistics offered by the article once again underscored the need for the systematic inclusion of a substantive financial literacy curriculum in every state's public high school education requirements. As long as we are depending on credit card companies to teach students about how to manage their finances, young people will only find themselves more hopelessly in debt that they probably could have avoided.