At this point, it may be helpful to

At this point, it may be helpful to ask: Who is benefiting from the confusion? If you said: not me, you’re correct.The credit card issuers are laughing all the way to the bank. And companies like airlines are practically printing money in their basement, thanks to their rewards schemes.For example, Delta Air Lines raked in $5.3 billion in fees in 2017, of which more than half came from its loyalty program. American Airlines raked in $5.2 billion the same year, of which 59% came from its loyalty program. That includes banks buying frequent flier miles to pass along to their cardholders.The reason this credit card debate can become so muddled is that the systems are incredibly complex. Just check out your cardmember agreement if you don’t believe me. There may be a business model behind all this: The more complex a financial instrument, the easier it is to pawn off on an unsuspecting public.It’s like credit default swaps, the financial instruments that led to the Great Recession and nearly led to the collapse of the U.S economy. Nobody really understood these instruments — after all, who has time to read the fine print?I