Consumer Protection

Is our food safe? What about the drugs we take? The cars we drive and the products we buy? Are the banks, credit card companies and lenders dealing fairly with us? In each case, federal agencies are charged with making sure the answer is “yes.” But examples of unsafe products and unfair practices abound in the marketplace.

For years, General Motors hid from regulators evidence that an ignition switch the company used in its Cobalts, Opels, Pontiacs, and Saturns had such a hair trigger that a light brush by the driver’s hand or knee would shut down the engine, disabling air bags and power steering. The resulting loss of control caused at least 13 fatal accidents. GM's ability to avoid detection for so many years says as much about the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's weak enforcement record as anything.

Other examples abound. From tainted peanut butter to toxic drywall, to lead-laden imported toys, such instances of unsafe food, drugs, automobiles and products are all too dangerous evidence of a failed system of regulation and enforcement. Often the failure is the result of neglect – a lack of political will to spend the money required to conduct meaningful research and enforcement. Sometimes the cause is ideological: a conviction that safeguards interfere unduly with industry profits. Either way, the result is that industry is spared the costs of being accountable for unsafe production practices, shifting those costs instead to consumers in the form of injuries, illness and worse.

Below, see what CPR Members Scholars and staff have had to say about it in reports, testimony, op-eds and more. Use the search box to narrow the list.

Protecting Public Health and the Environment by the Stroke of a Presidential Pen: Seven Executive Orders for the President's First 100 Days

Protecting Public Health and the Environment by the Stroke of a Presidential Pen: Seven Executive Orders for the President's First 100 Days, By CPR Member Scholars Rebecca M. Bratspies, David M. Driesen, Robert L. Fischman, Sheila Foster, Eileen Gauna, Robert L. Glicksman, Alexandra B. Klass, Catherine A. O’Neill, Sidney Shapiro, Amy Sinden, Rena Steinzor, Robert R.M. Verchick, and Wendy Wagner, and CPR Policy Analyst James Goodwin

Type: Reports (Nov. 13, 2008)
Read PDF
The Truth About Torts: Regulatory Preemption at the Consumer Product Safety Commission

The Truth About Torts: Regulatory Preemption at the Consumer Product Safety Commission, CPR White Paper 807.

Type: Reports (Nov. 5, 2008)
Read PDF
Author(s): Bill Funk, Thomas McGarity, Nina Mendelson, Sidney Shapiro, David Vladeck, Matt Shudtz
Beware Dangers of Roof Crush Rule

Beware Dangers of Roof Crush Rule, op-ed by Nina Mendelson, William Funk, and Sidney Shapiro

Type: Op-Eds (Aug. 4, 2008)
Read PDF
Author(s): Nina Mendelson, Bill Funk, Sidney Shapiro
The Truth about Torts: Regulatory Preemption at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

The Truth about Torts: Regulatory Preemption at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, CPR White Paper 804

Type: Reports (July 16, 2008)
Read PDF
Author(s): Bill Funk, Thomas McGarity, Nina Mendelson, Sidney Shapiro, David Vladeck, Matt Shudtz
The danger in defective medical devices

The danger in defective medical devices, op-ed by Thomas McGarity

Type: Op-Eds (Dec. 4, 2007)
Read PDF
Author(s): Thomas McGarity
The Truth about Torts: Using Agency Preemption to Undercut Consumer Health and Safety

The Truth about Torts: Using Agency Preemption to Undercut Consumer Health and Safety, by William Funk, Sidney Shapiro, David Vladeck and Karen Sokol, White Paper 704

Type: Reports (Sept. 12, 2007)
Read PDF
Author(s): Bill Funk, Sidney Shapiro, David Vladeck, Karen Sokol
The Truth about Torts: Lawyers, Guns, and Money

The Truth about Torts: Lawyers, Guns, and Money, by Thomas O. McGarity, Douglas A. Kysar, and Karen Sokol, White Paper 603, July 2006.

Type: Reports (July 12, 2006)
Read PDF
Author(s): Thomas McGarity, Douglas Kysar, Karen Sokol

Advanced Search Filters

Reset Filters