CFC in the News

State regulators should have the power to veto health insurance industry attempts to unjustifiably gouge consumers. The California State legislature should immediately support this effort to rein in rising premiums costs – a step already taken by 36 states.

We hope this scorecard can help Californians evaluate whether their lawmakers voted on behalf of their interests when it comes to issues that affect their pocketbooks, privacy, and health and safety, but often get little news coverage.

On issues ranging from household toxics to food safety to elder abuse to personal privacy, Governor Jerry Brown has demonstrated much greater empathy with consumer protection than his predecessor.

When embarrassing exposes don't get an industry's attention, regulations become necessary. AB 688 is a logical companion to federal food and drug safety standards. It's time that retailers got the message that it is not a'ceptable to sell expired food and medication.

Persistence paid off for Senator Joe Simitian. Governor Jerry Brown just signed Simitian’s Senate Bill 24, which will arm consumers with information to help prevent identity theft.

A bill to regulate health insurance rate hikes faces fierce industry opposition as it moves through the legislature. AB 52 (Feuer) would rein in health and HMO premium increases that soared 131% from 1999 to 2009 - nearly five times the rate of inflation.

With the stroke of an autopen from the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, the once articulate critic of the Patriot Act signed a four year extension of the most dangerous assault on American civil liberties in US history without a single additional privacy protection.

This is an important victory for consumer access to the courts in cases where businesses engage in false advertising. It is also a big win for American workers, and for the high standards that must apply to the "Made in the USA" label.

An increasingly extreme anti-consumer Republican minority that votes in favor of corporate interests nearly 100% of the time as a block, combined with a growing number of corporate inclined Democrats, has led to a slim working majority able to commonly kill, or severely weaken, the more significant efforts to establish some semblance of justice in the marketplace.

PG&E spent $46 million of its ratepayer dollars on Prop 16 to make sure our electric rates remain high, without asking the consent of its ratepayers.

...all but one of the donors to the ballot committee opposing Prop 15 comes from either a lobby firm, individual lobbyist, or a lobby employer – including BP's lobby firm, Political Solutions.

Prop 16 is a laboratory example of how the ballot initiative has been twisted from its initial purpose of serving citizen democracy into yet another weapon in the arsenal of an arrogant special interest. Our votes should speak louder than PG&E’s millions. This June, send Prop 16 packing.

The Consumer Federation of California witnesses first hand how this "pay to play" system undermines the public interest, as one proposed consumer protection law after another is crushed under a ton of corporate special-interest donations.

...the effect of broadcasters' refusal to provide under-funded campaigns free response time since the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine for ballot measures...has been to increase the amount of one-sided information voters receive before entering the voting booth.

Bungling Democrats should acknowledge they lost the fight for the support of the people on health care reform. The sooner they flee this field of battle, and move on to issues that re-connect them with the mood of America, the better their chances to salvage the mid-term elections.

Before we...willfully give up our civil liberties and freedoms, support wars on countries that did nothing to us, and sign off on wasting HUGE amounts of money on ineffectual security systems, consider this: Your chances of getting hit by lightning in one year is 500,000 to 1 while the odds you'll be killed by a terrorist on a plane over 10 years is 10 million to 1.

Each year Californians are treated to a Governor Schwarzenegger makeover when he gives his State of the State address. Schwarzenegger version 7.0 used a quaint story about a pig and a pony to emphasize the need for lawmakers of both parties to work together to solve the horrific budget disaster over which he has presided.

In addition to reforming our pay-to-play campaign finance system, we progressives must redouble our efforts if we expect to pose any kind of challenge to the moneyed interests that dominate the state capitol.

Wall Street knows a gold mine when it sees one, and it likes what it saw in the Senate health care bill. Health insurance company stocks soared to an 18 month high the day the Democrats reached the magic 60 votes needed for passage of its overhaul bill.

The only real interest "clash" will be between those that want to protect privacy and the right to control one's own data versus those that seek to profit off or benefit from accessing, buying and selling it.

Governor Schwarzenegger's final verdict on a host of critical consumer protection bills this past weekend left consumer advocates disappointed. Of the 14 bills identified by the Consumer Federation of California (CFC) as most important, in only six instances did the Governor take the side of the consumer.

Don’t believe headlines that proclaim this a budget that everyone hates. Big oil and other profitable corporations made out like bandits.

The scorecard should help Californians evaluate how your state representatives voted on consumer protection bills that affect our pocketbooks, our privacy, and our health and safety, but often get little news coverage.

Sacramento is in the grip of budget cuts that will harm programs that serve tens of millions of Californians. One agency slated for destruction protects Californians from toxic exposures. If eliminated, the result could be increased rates of cancer, neurologic and reproductive damage...

While it should be noted that the Obama Administration's position is an improvement over that taken by President Bush - who was actively supporting the banks appeal, arguing that California should not be permitted to regulate banks' privacy practices - this brief does not translate into a victory for privacy advocates.

The Governor failed to mention the $2.5 billion in permanent tax cuts that he and lawmakers lavished on profitable corporations in the 2008-2009 budget deals at a time they were raising taxes on workers and consumers and slashing funding to schools, transit and health clinics.

As government regulators and private consumer attorneys seek to hold AIG and its Wall Street friends to account for misconduct that has destroyed the jobs, homes and retirement savings of millions of Americans, these onetime financial titans are scurrying to slam shut the courthouse doors on their victims.

H.R. 627 represents a long overdue effort by Congress to address what is rapidly becoming a second "subprime like meltdown" that could send our economy into an even deeper recession - if not depression. Neither Congress nor the California Legislature acted quickly or boldly enough to deal with the subprime meltdown – and their failure has been catastrophic to millions of American households.

Unlike the behind the scenes dealings by Senator Maldonado to horse trade his vote in exchange for having his "open primary" system added to the 2010 ballot, AB 583 was supported by thousands of California voters who contacted their legislators urging support for "Fair Elections".

The budget fiasco has provoked a healthy discussion of the need for governance reform. The starting point for reform should be asserting the democratic principle of majority rule. California must eliminate super-majority requirements that facilitate budget tyranny by a small cabal of extremist lawmakers.

...the DMV contract proposal would give government snoops new weapons to identify and record your presence at a protest rally or picket line. California lawmakers should stand up against the further expansion of government data collection technology that can be used to invade our privacy without first setting ironclad rules that limit its use to essential and lawful purposes.

Lawmakers face painful choices in closing the budget gap. In light of the severe cuts that will disproportionately affect the lives of the least fortunate among us, we believe an oil severance fee is a painless and overdue measure of tax fairness.

Every year the Consumer Federation of California monitors, supports, and opposes dozens of bills related to consumer rights. Every year many of these bills are "killed" in the legislature while many others reach the Governor’s desk to either be signed into law or vetoed.

The California Progress Report is that site. Its unique value is that it provides an open on-line forum for dozens of advocacy groups that post news and opinion pieces about statewide issues.

Anticipating the post-election day spin coming from T Boone Pickens’ flaks, let’s make one thing perfectly clear: The defeat of Proposition 10 was not due to a sour voter mood regarding the economy.

The biggest bonanza under Proposition 10 goes to - you guessed it - Mr. Pickens' Clean Energy Fuel Corp. This company dominates the natural gas fueling business. Proposition 10 earmarks billions in tax giveaways to distort the market to favor natural gas-powered vehicles and to disadvantage cleaner energy technologies.

Two privacy protection bills introduced by Senator Joe Simitian (SB 29 and SB 31) are awaiting Governor Schwarzenegger's signature or veto. They address privacy concerns and problems with "skimming" - the unauthorized surreptitious reading of RFIDs by persons with malicious intent.

Proposition 10 spends billions in tax giveaways to manipulate the marketplace to favor natural gas as a "clean" vehicle fuel to the disadvantage of cleaner alternative energy technologies.

The Consumer Federation of California (CFC) strongly urges Governor Schwarzenegger to sign AB 1333 (Hancock) - a bill that will protect tenants in foreclosed properties and help keep families in their homes.

If enacted, H.R. 5244 would help tens of millions of Americans avoid increasing and undeserved debt while beginning a long overdue effort by Congress to prevent a second "subprime like meltdown" that would send our economy into an even deeper recession.

The Consumer Federation of California opposed SB 1096 (Calderon) because it raised significant privacy and health care concerns for patients.

With customer service declining and the number of airline passengers rising, more and more passengers are ending up suffering with lengthy flight delays, canceled flights and on occasion finding themselves trapped in airplanes for interminable hours before taking off.

As California's foreclosure crisis continues unabated and families are being ousted from their homes at an unprecedented pace, the state legislature is finally taking action.

The measure fails to address skyrocketing health insurance premium costs. During the years 2000 - 2005, health insurance premiums escalated by 87 percent, which is over four times the rate of inflation.

When AT&T, Sprint, Verizon and T-Mobile look at our state's growing immigrant population, they see one thing money, and lots of it...But when it comes time to close the deal with a non-English speaking customer, the big phone companies don't want to put their verbal promises in writing in a language that the customer can read.