Now we know credit card debt has truly arrived.  There’s a new way to win money on the radio.  In addition to the usual cash prizes and concert tickets, Boston’s local Top 40 station, Kiss 108, has started paying listeners’ credit card bills.  Contestants send in a copy of their credit card bill and an explanation of why they can’t pay it themselves.  The radio station then announces the lucky debtors in much the same way that it would announce the winners of Justin Timberlake tickets.

One of the great things about this contest is that it provides a window
into who the radio station considers “deserving” of this prize.  Unlike
a typical radio-station contest, where the winner is the eighteenth
caller who gets through during the third 50 Cent song of the hour, this
time the DJ explains why the radio station has picked this person to
help. 

The stories are a lens into America—at least America seen from the
perspective of a DJ at Kiss 108.  Some of the explanations have a
Two-Income Trap ring to them.  I heard one about a woman who got sick
and could no longer pay her bill.  Others have a “party on, bro” feel,
which isn’t surprising in light of the station’s young listener
demographic.  The DJ will say something like, “He spent too much at the
clubs, and now he can’t pay it all back. Well, we’re going to help him
out.” 

The contest appeals to my inner empirical researcher.  Kiss 108 is
handing out free data at the rate of one or two credit card stories an
hour – if you can handle listening to all the Danity Kane in between.
Who knows what I might learn?  I’ve been trying to figure out how to
digitally record the station all day and then skim through the material
at night.  In the meantime, it’s certainly upped my Shakira intake.