We believe: Americans need to keep a close eye on how much they spend with their credit cards.

If there was one overarching theme in 2007, it was debt. Americans are swimming in it, and many are drowning. From subprime mortgages to credit cards, Americans are spending way more than they’re taking in. Something has to give before bankruptcy becomes not the exception but the rule.

An Associated Press story last week stated that credit card accounts at least 30 days delinquent jumped 26 percent to $17.3 billion in October from 2006. Defaults, where lenders essentially write off the debt because they have no hope of collecting it, jumped 18 percent to $961 million in October.

Some economists call Americans’ cavalier attitude toward credit cards no big deal, as the AP reported. Do these economists, enjoying lucrative salaries and isolated in academia, know what the word “irresponsible” means?

As the debt widens in 2008, defaults will rise, putting a serious dent in lenders’ profit margins, and those with the debt will find themselves in a nightmare of losing everything they own.

There are two dynamics at work here, and both deserve a share of the blame. First, banks that issue credit cards (and subprime loans) flood people’s mailboxes with easy applications for cards. Low-interest rates are promised along with high credit ceilings. When delinquent accounts start building up, interest rates on credit cards can jump up to 30 percent on top of late fees.

Banks and other lending institutions see escalating interest and late fees as a prime source of income. When the defaults start happening, however, the losses begin affecting the entire economic process.

The second dynamic is best summed up Howard Dvorkin of Consolidated Credit Counseling Service in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., who told the AP: “The desires of consumers to want, want, want, spend, spend, spend, it’s the fabric of our nation.”

He’s right about those desires. Americans see their neighbors acquire stuff, and they want it. They see credit cards as an easy way to accumulate things. There was a time, in the generation preceding the baby boomers, that the mantra was not to go into debt. Now it’s, “We want it all and we want it right now.” The fabric of our nation needs some new stitches and a blast of common economic sense.

After a 2005 law, bankruptcy is not much of an option anymore. Consumers cannot file Chapter 7, where debts are wiped out, but have to file Chapter 13, which requires a lot more payback.

It’s true that spending is the economic engine of the nation. But consumers have gone too far, and lenders were right there dangling the carrot. Lenders, like consumers, want it all and want it now.

The only path back to fiscal health is to learn to control spending impulses. Those in deep financial trouble will continue to get credit card applications in the mail by lenders looking for a quick profit. Throw them away. Don’t become a prisoner to debt. It’s an old-fashioned ethic in this day of instant gratification, but learn to live within your means. The other option is too painful to deal with.