The title of the hearing is "Examining the CFPB’s Proposed Rulemaking on Arbitration: Is it in the Public Interest and for the Protection of Consumers?" It will take place Wednesday, May 18. The witnesses seem not to have been announced, but given the composition of the Committee, I think we can anticipate the majority answering […]
Category Archives: Class Actions
by Jeff Sovern Jean Sternlight of UNLV is circulating an impressive and well-argued letter for law professors to sign supporting the CFPB's proposed arbitration regulation. According to my count, 139 have already signed it. If you would like to add your name to the list, please email Jean at jean.sternlight@unlv.edu no later than May 20.
by Jeff Sovern Earlier today, the US Chamber of Commerce released a letter to CFPB Director Richard Cordray from David Hirschmann, President and CEO, Center for Capital Markets Competitiveness, urging the Director to address certain issues at Thursday's CFPB arbitration field hearing. Here's one of those issues, as stated in the letter: [T]he public would benefit […]
Russell M. Gold of NYU and Wake Forest has written Compensation's Role in Deterrence, forthcoming in 91 Notre Dame Law Review (2016). Here is the abstract: There are plenty of non-economic reasons to care whether victims are compensated in class actions. The traditional law and economics view, however, is that when individual claim values are […]
Howard M. Erichson of Fordham has written Aggregation as Disempowerment, 92 Notre Dame Law Review (Forthcoming). Here is the abstract: Class action critics and proponents cling to the conventional wisdom that class actions empower claimants. Critics complain that class actions over-empower claimants and put defendants at a disadvantage, while proponents defend class actions as essential to […]
Here. Because the Bureau usually combines field hearings with announcements of related developments, it is likely to announce its proposed arbitration rules that day.
Here. Excerpt: Greed is undermining class actions, according to Ted Frank, founder and director of the Center for Class Action Fairness in Washington. Consumer and other class settlements often pay more to trial lawyers than to their clients, Frank says, and he's devoted his professional life to fighting that trend. Frank is an objector—a lawyer […]
Here. Excerpt: [M]any of the Roberts Court’s most important business cases were decided by a 5–4 margin, with the five conservative Justices voting as a bloc. And, as [Vanderbilt law professor Brian] Fitzpatrick points out, “Scalia has done more than any other justice in making it difficult for consumers and employees to bring class-action suits. […]