They don't make much money off people that rack up $25,000 of debt and then refuse to pay, or people that borrow $500,000 for a house that's worth $150,000 who then leave and stop paying the mortgage.

People that pay the minimum payment on their credit card every month are great -- if everyone did that, there would be no credit crisis. I would be getting my 5% on savings, and would probably be able to own a house.

Actually most banks did make money from those transactions. They knew it was a bad debt so they sold it before people defaulted. The US housing bubble actually ended up sucking up a lot of money from the rest of the world and dumping in on the US economy.