[mvpel]

Banks started raising rates for no real reason a few years back.

No real reason? You don't count legislative pounding as a "real reason?"

When they're forced by law to allow you to pay down the highest interest balances first, for example, that radically changes their price structures, as does capping subprime card fees and interest rates for people with bad credit.

When you change the laws, for better or worse, the credit card companies are going to make adjustments to take those changes into account, usually by raising their interest rates.

[wagglebee]

You have a point. However, there is no reason that rates for people with excellent credit should have been raised to the same level as those with horrible credit.

NONE of this would have happened if banks hadn't given credit cards to people who never should have had them to begin with.