Stay-at-home parents are voicing their opposition to a provision in the Credit CARD Act that they say denies them fair access to credit.
Holly McCall, a stay-at-home mom from Vienna, Va., who started the campaign on Change.org in partnership with the grassroots advocacy group MomsRising, plans to deliver more than 30,000 petitions to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Tuesday.
Her movement asks the CFPB to change the regulation that prohibits non-working spouses from using household income when applying for credit cards.
McCall says she has “an impeccable” credit score and manages the majority of her family’s finances, including 95% of household purchases. She started her petition after she was denied her own credit card, because she has no individual income, and was told that in order to be approved for a card she would need her husband’s permission.
“Because I’m a stay-at-home mom, I can’t get my own credit card. My husband has to give me permission to get my own line of credit. This is demeaning and flat out unfair. This isn’t ‘Mad Men’, it’s 2012,” McCall said.
According to tracking on change.org’s website, McCall’s petition current has 33,200 signatures with a goal of 35,000.
