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Consumer Protection

OSPIRG’s consumer program works to alert the public to hidden dangers and scams and to ban anti-consumer practices and unsafe products. If you have a question or concern on a consumer issue, see OSPIRG's consumer resources below, or ask your question directly. We'll get back to you with an answer.

RESOURCES FOR CONSUMERS

TROUBLE IN TOYLAND

For 25 years, OSPIRG’s "Trouble In Toyland" report has surveyed store shelves and identified choking hazards, noise hazards and other dangers. Our report has led to at least 150 recalls and other regulatory actions over the years.

Get our tips for buying safer toys.

BIGGER BANKS, BIGGER FEES
In April, OSPIRG released a report in which we surveyed more than 350 bank branches and revealed that fewer than half of branches obeyed their legal duty to fully disclose fees to prospective customers, while one in four provided no fee information at all. We also found that despite widespread stories about the “death” of free checking, free and low-cost checking choices are still widely available, if consumers shop around.

Find out how to beat high bank fees.

RENTERS RIGHTS
In the United States, you can protect your legal rights only if you know what those rights are. Renting is a two-way street. Renters and landlords may unknowingly jeopardize their rights by not fulfilling their legal responsibilities.

Know your rights

SEE ALL CONSUMER RESOURCES

Issue updates

Blog Post | Food

2.8 billion Twinkies is a lot of Twinkies | David Rosenfeld

We’ve already documented that at least $1 billion in taxpayer dollars directly subsidize the production of junk food ingredients like high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated vegetable oils that are the main ingredients in Twinkies, soda and other junk food products. If you spent all that money on Twinkies, it would be enough to buy about 2.8 billion of those golden colored sweets (at the estimated wholesale rate of 36 cents per Twinkie), or about 19 Twinkies per taxpayer. But the fun math doesn’t need to stop there, especially when we’re talking 2.8 billion Twinkies.

 

> Keep Reading
Blog Post | Consumer Protection

Have you ever experienced a yo-yo scam from a car dealer? | David Rosenfeld

Our friends at the Center for Responsible Lending just released a new report on yo-yo car buying scams.

> Keep Reading
Blog Post | Consumer Protection

50 Years Ago This Week, JFK Ushered in Modern Consumer Protection Era | Ed Mierzwinski

I've got a new column at Huffington Post, "50 Years Ago This Week, JFK Ushered in Modern Consumer Protection Era." I discuss President Kennedy's visionary "Special Message to the Congress on Protecting the Consumer Interest" announced on March 15, 1962. He declared that consumers have rights and government should protect them. Read the full column after the jump.

> Keep Reading
Blog Post | Consumer Protection

B of A tests new fees, CFPB asks for your checking account complaints | Ed Mierzwinski

Reporters are calling about BofA's proposed new checking account fees, "Ed, what does it mean?" Meanwhile the CFPB says checking accounts can be "complex and confusing" and announced it is now  ready and waiting for your checking account complaints. Find out more.

> Keep Reading
Blog Post | Consumer Protection

CFPB to possibly end $39 lattes | Ed Mierzwinski

Today, CFPB to announce overdraft fee investigation, unveil "penalty box" disclosure, possibly end $39 lattes.

> Keep Reading

Pages

Media Hit | Consumer Protection

Data breaches in 2011 carry unknown personal costs

In 2011, news about the loss of personal data became background noise. Unless it happened to you.

> Keep Reading
Media Hit | Food

Should Government Subsidize Crops Used in Junk Food?

As the obesity epidemic continues, consumer advocates at PIRG are asking whether Washington should subsidize crops used to make junk food.

> Keep Reading
Media Hit | Consumer Protection

New laws for 2012

Consumers will be able to put some cash back into their wallets with a new law on gift cards.

> Keep Reading
News Release | OSPIRG | Food

Subsides for twinkies or apples

With childhood obesity rates rapidly rising, the federal government continues to pour billions into subsidies for junk food.

> Keep Reading
News Release | OSPIRG | Food

What do Obama and Glenn Beck agree on?

A consumer protection group released a new video today juxtaposing President Obama and conservative TV show host Glenn Beck on agricultural subsidies.

> Keep Reading

Pages

Result | Consumer Protection

KIDS’ SCHOOL LUNCHES NOW SAFER

For years, America’s schoolchildren have been eating beef, chicken and other foods that would have been rejected as substandard even by fast food chains. Thanks in part to our advocacy, the U.S.D.A. has stopped buying such low-quality meat for school lunches.

> Keep Reading
Result | Consumer Protection, Health Care

Plan to cut health care waste moves ahead in Oregon

Members of the Oregon Health Policy Board approved a plan to cut health care administrative waste and save Oregonians $100 million per year in the process.

> Keep Reading
Result | Consumer Protection, Higher Ed

Wasteful student lender subsidies cut. Winner: students.

Congress finally ended wasteful subsidies to student lenders that diverted billions of dollars annually away from helping more students go to college.

> Keep Reading
Result | Consumer Protection, Health Care

Victory! Oregon Legislature Passes Landmark Health Reform

The bills expand access, tackle soaring costs, and set a path for possible public plan option. Passage of HB 2009 bodes especially well for national reform efforts to tame health care costs, which include many of the same strategies as the Oregon bill.

> Keep Reading
Report | Consumer Protection

Trouble in Toyland

The 2011 Trouble in Toyland report is our 26th annual survey of toy safety. In this report, we provide safety guidelines for consumers when purchasing toys for young children and provide examples of toys currently on store shelves that may pose potential safety hazards.

> Keep Reading
Report | Consumer Protection

Big Banks, Bigger Fees

Since Congress largely deregulated consumer deposit (checking and savings) accounts beginning in the early 1980s, the PIRGs have tracked bank deposit account fee changes and documented the banks’ long-term strategy to raise fees, invent new fees and make it harder to avoid fees. 

> Keep Reading
Report | Food

Apples to Twinkies

America is facing an obesity epidemic – one that’s hitting children especially hard. Childhood obesity rates have tripled over the last three decades, with one in five kids aged 6 to 11 now obese.

> Keep Reading
Report | OSPIRG Foundation | Consumer Protection, Financial Reform

10 Reasons We Need The CFPB Now

This report outlines predatory financial practices that hurt consumers and helped collapse the economy, and details “10 Reasons We Need The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Now.”

> Keep Reading
Report | OSPIRG | Consumer Protection, Food

Recipe for Disaster

To assess one cost of not strengthening our food safety system, Consumer Federation of America, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, and U.S. Public Interest Research Group studied recalls of foods regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) from August 1, 2009, to October 2010. That study found that a wide variety of foods were recalled in the 13-month period due to contamination by Salmonella, Listeria monocytogenes, and other bacteria.

> Keep Reading

Pages

Blog Post | Food

2.8 billion Twinkies is a lot of Twinkies | David Rosenfeld

We’ve already documented that at least $1 billion in taxpayer dollars directly subsidize the production of junk food ingredients like high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated vegetable oils that are the main ingredients in Twinkies, soda and other junk food products. If you spent all that money on Twinkies, it would be enough to buy about 2.8 billion of those golden colored sweets (at the estimated wholesale rate of 36 cents per Twinkie), or about 19 Twinkies per taxpayer. But the fun math doesn’t need to stop there, especially when we’re talking 2.8 billion Twinkies.

 

> Keep Reading
Blog Post | Consumer Protection

Have you ever experienced a yo-yo scam from a car dealer? | David Rosenfeld

Our friends at the Center for Responsible Lending just released a new report on yo-yo car buying scams.

> Keep Reading
Blog Post | Consumer Protection

50 Years Ago This Week, JFK Ushered in Modern Consumer Protection Era | Ed Mierzwinski

I've got a new column at Huffington Post, "50 Years Ago This Week, JFK Ushered in Modern Consumer Protection Era." I discuss President Kennedy's visionary "Special Message to the Congress on Protecting the Consumer Interest" announced on March 15, 1962. He declared that consumers have rights and government should protect them. Read the full column after the jump.

> Keep Reading
Blog Post | Consumer Protection

B of A tests new fees, CFPB asks for your checking account complaints | Ed Mierzwinski

Reporters are calling about BofA's proposed new checking account fees, "Ed, what does it mean?" Meanwhile the CFPB says checking accounts can be "complex and confusing" and announced it is now  ready and waiting for your checking account complaints. Find out more.

> Keep Reading
Blog Post | Consumer Protection

CFPB to possibly end $39 lattes | Ed Mierzwinski

Today, CFPB to announce overdraft fee investigation, unveil "penalty box" disclosure, possibly end $39 lattes.

> Keep Reading

Pages

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