Today's Blog of the Legal Times has this interesting post about the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's use of investigatory demands on potential enforcement targets in the financial services industry.
Author Archives: Brian Wolfman
As explained in this LA Times story, "[m]ore than 3.5 million Discover credit card customers will share $200 million in refunds in the wake of a federal investigation [by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the FDIC] that determined the bank tricked people into signing up for payment protection plans and other add-on services." The […]
In this Wall St. Journal op-ed, Congressman Randy Neugebauer (R-TX) says that the Consumer Financial Services Bureau is not transparent about how it plans to spend its money. He also says that the CFPB pays its employees too much money: A review of the bureau's salaries as of Aug. 28, 2012, reveals that approximately 60% […]
We explained here that after the Supreme Court threw out the nationwide employment discrimination class action against Wal-Mart on behalf of hundreds of thousands of women, the class lawyers pushed ahead with smaller class actions and in helping women process individual claims against Wal-Mart. And now, district judge Charles Breyer in San Francisco has rebuffed […]
Read this extensive post at Naked Capitalism entitled "'The Drugs Don't Work': How the Medical-Industrial Complex Systematically Suppresses Negativess Studies." Here's a very brief excerpt: [Although] the overt corruption of science at work in the drug arena … comes to light from time to time, often in the context of litigation, the lay public is […]
As you may know, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has recently named its Consumer Advocacy Board. Go here to read its members' names and bios. The Board will have its first public meeting in St. Louis on September 27. CFPB head Richard Cordray will speak (and presumably introduce the advisory board). Here's how the CFPB […]
The Congressional Budget Office has released a study on the effect of federal tax credits on the purchase of all-electric cars and plug-in hybrids. (A summary of the study is here, and the full study and underlying data can be accessed from here.) The tax credits can be as much as $7,500 per car. That […]
Arsenic is a potential human carcinogen. Federal regulation limits arsenic in drinking water to 10 parts per billion. (The strictest state-law limit is in New Jersey, where the limit is 5 ppb.) An in-depth study by Consumers Union has found surprisingly high levels of arsenic in foods containing rice. Arsenic gets into food in various […]
From Stephen Colbert here and embedded below: The Colbert ReportGet More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive
At this blog, we have covered the increasing size of the country's aggregate student loan debt and the question whether college is worth the cost for many people with student loan debt. Catherine Rampell, drawing on work done at the Hamilton Project, says here that college is generally a good investment even for those who take on […]