Despite the fact that tough times continue across America--and in our opinion, to stay around for some time to come--we are still racking up gobs of credit.

American families are carrying an average of almost $16,000 in credit card debt.

Heavy debt burdens forced nearly 1.5 million Americans to declare bankruptcy in 2011.

To make matters worse, 4.2 million homeowners have not made a mortgage payment for ONE YEAR...or more.

Never has it been more important to get our credit under control.

But easy credit (not so easy paying it back) is still a temptation to 78% of consumers who carry one or more credit cards...currently with an average APR of 14.89%.

We have more than 1 BILLION AMEX, VISA and MasterCard credit and debit cards in our wallets and pocketbooks!

That's not to say all Americans are cavalier about getting into debt for frivolous reasons. We hear from people who were forced into debt because of an emergency, unexpectedly loosing their jobs or who financed their business start-up by maxing out their personal credit cards.

A woman in her sixties called The Dolans radio show to say she wanted to retire and had $53,000 in her retirement account, but $45,000 in debt from credit cards and loans. Talk about a big dose of reality. We told her, point blank, that she would probably have to keep working for years to come in order to pay off those debts.

A man in his seventies phoned in to our show and confessed he had a maxed-out credit card that his wife of almost 50 years knew nothing about. He was worried that if he died before paying it off, she would be saddled with a bill their meager pension and Social Security benefits could never pay.

The actual stories we hear are a lot worse than these statistics. All too often someone calls us saying they can no longer make the minimum payments on three, six, even 12 credit cards.

Next: Get on track with our Debt Clinic Worksheet

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