60% of Japanese gold credit card customers earn less than $27,000 annually, Surveys

Tokyo -- According to a recent survey, almost 60% of Japanese credit card holders have annual incomes of less than 4 million yen (about $27,000), suggesting that once-prestigious credit cards are becoming increasingly widespread in the nation.

The credit card usage poll was carried out in mid-October by mobile carrier giant NTT Docomo Inc., with 7,000 respondents countrywide in the 15–79 age range. The results among gold card holders have been examined by the corporation (1,613 in the preliminary poll and 617 in the main survey).

When asked what their yearly income was, "less than 2 million yen (roughly $13,500)" came in first place with 39.6% of respondents, followed by "2 million yen and more, but less than 4 million yen" with 23.2%. This means that 62.8% of gold credit card holders earned less than 4 million yen per year. At 17.2%, "4 million yen and more, but less than 6 million yen ($40,500)" came next. In all, the income group of less than 6 million yen accounted for 80% of gold credit card holders.

Twenty.6% of respondents said that "it's easy to earn points or miles" was the reason they had gold credit cards. Merely 4.2% of respondents gave the gold card's "prestigious status" as their explanation.

When asked which credit cards they use as their primary credit cards, 48.6% of gold card holders responded with "return rates for points or miles," followed by 42.3% with "various ways to use points or miles" and 27.7% with the statement that their primary credit cards are those issued by the stores or establishments they frequent. According to these responses, a lot of people utilize their gold credit cards to accrue miles or points.

NTT Docomo made the following observation: "Many homemakers and students fall into the income band of less than 4 million yen. Today, anyone can obtain a gold credit card; one is no longer required to demonstrate their social standing in order to obtain one."