Why is it scam when it helps poor guys get what only the rich guys could get before? A line of credit is a very important asset especially when you are poor - it opens a lot of doors. The minimum payment is not a scam either - you can pay more than that without any penalties.
Your beef should be not with credit card companies but with low a wages and lack of public services that expose people to financial risks and require the use of credit cards as a last resort solution.
I've been through that myself and as long as I was paying off all balances within a month or two I was OK. What pushed me over the edge was an expensive car repair and my own irresponsible behavior (impulse purchases, not making an effort to pay off the balance). Thank dog for Chapter 7.
I agree though that MBNA is a usurious scumbag - albeit they are the ones that gave me a credit card on decent terms after my Chapter 7 relatively "low" (by credit card terms) interest no annual fee, decent limit, (I guess they figured out that I would not be able to pull a similar trick any time soon). I still use their card and pay off the balance in a month or two to avoid finance charges, but the scumbags recently introduced a foreign transaction fee so I switched to other cards.
The bottom line is, however, that credit card is a valuable asset (especially for the low and moderate income folk who do not sit on a lot of savings) and there is nothing wrong to pay a reasonable fee for that asset. Unfortunately, many credit card companies charge very unreasonable fees, but one can still get decent deals from credit unions and kindred institutions.
Wojtek