For those of you who haven't been following the fight to unionize NCAA football players, spearheaded by Northwestern players, this Daily Show piece is a great summary of the issue. (Here is ESPN's summary of the state of affairs: players have voted on whether to unionize — results not yet known. An NLRB regional office ruled […]
Author Archives: Scott Michelman
…is the subtitle of this Al Jazeera America piece on the use of tribal sovereign immunity to shield payday lenders from the reach of consumer protection laws (while, incidentally, providing little benefit to the tribes themselves). As the article explains: Tribal sovereignty allows the rancherias’ businesses to claim immunity from state usury laws, making them […]
Last week the California Supreme Court granted review in People v. Miami Nation Enterprises, which presents the issue of when a payday lending operation that is formally owned by a Native American tribe but run by a third-party who keeps most of the proceeds is protected by tribal sovereign immunity. The practice of payday lenders […]
…is the catchy title of an NPR reporting series airing this week about the rise of new "debtors' prisons" as a result of state and local court practices across the country. According to the written summary of the story, everyday, people go to jail because they failed to pay their court debts. In Benton County, […]
As the Washington Post reports, a proposal pending before the Senate would require the IRS to turn unpaid tax bills over to private debt collectors. The proposal would, in the Post's words, "reviv[e] a program that has previously led to complaints of harassment and has not saved taxpayers money." The leading proponent is Democrat Chuck […]
by Andrew Selbst, guest blogger A few weeks ago, the FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler proposed a new “net neutrality” plan which is clearly anything but. While the new proposal would prevent Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from blocking competitors’ websites outright, it would also permit ISPs to make agreements with services such as Netflix for internet […]
As we've discussed before on the blog (see, for instance, here and here), in 2012 an online retailer called KlearGear tried to extort $3500 from its customer John Palmer because his wife Jen criticized the company online; when John refused to pay, KlearGear reported the supposed “debt” to the credit agencies, ruining John’s credit for […]
We've written before about the FCC's most recent (and troubling) proposal for net neutrality. Now comes this letter to FCC Chair Tom Wheeler, signed by the four top House Republicans, opposing any attempt to reclassify the internet in such a way as to promote net neutrality. Doing so, the letter argues, "threatens to slow job creation […]
We've told you about the long saga to coax the DOT to issue a rear visibility safety standard, as mandated by Congress six years ago, to help prevent "backover" crashes, which primarily affect young children and the elderly. Six weeks ago, DOT finally issued the long-delayed standard, which will effectively require backup cameras in all […]
Yesterday, Company Doe unmasked itself: it’s the baby-carrier maker Ergobaby. It was a smart move to share its side of the story (and a fascinating story it is, told here by Alison Frankel of Reuters and worth a read). Ergobaby has every right to defend itself in the press — that is, in fact, the […]