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Report | U.S. PIRG Education Fund, Demos | Democracy

Distorted Democracy: Post-Election Spending Analysis

A new analysis of data through Election Day from the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and other sources by U.S. PIRG and Demos shows how big outside spenders drowned out small contributions in 2012: just 61 large donors to Super PACs giving an average of $4.7 million each matched the $285.2 million in grassroots contributions from more than 1,425,500 small donors to the major party presidential candidates. 

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Blog Post | Democracy

Youth vote surges in election | Ed Mierzwinski

In case you missed it, the Student PIRG New Voters Campaign has a release explaining that "the youth share of the electorate increased to 19 percent in 2012 over 18 percent in 2008." The PIRGs helped register over 100,000 new voters in this cycle.

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Blog Post | Health Care

What's Next on Health Care Costs? | Laura Etherton

Now that the election is over, talk has turned to the need to work together and get results for America. It’s a tall order, and on the polarized issue of health care, it may seem like an impossible task. But here's why I'm optimistic that we can in fact make progress.

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Blog Post | Financial Reform

Court rejects First Amendment attack on credit bureau regulation and other financial follies | Ed Mierzwinski

In an important case joined by the government, a U.S. district judge has rejected the latest misguided industry attack on the constitutionality of regulation of credit bureaus. Meanwhile, the CFPB has released its first annual report on credit card deals with colleges. Here's a weekly summary of the latest financial follies.

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News Release | U.S. PIRG, COPIRG | Democracy

Colorado to Congress: Get Big Money Out!

Colorado voters have approved Amendment 65, which directs its Congressional delegation to pass a constitutional amendment rejecting the Supreme Court's equation of money and speech, by an overwhelming margin, sending a clear message to their elected officials – get big money out of our elections.

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Media Hit | Higher Ed

New York Times: On Campus, New Deals With Banks

“Campus debit cards are wolves in sheep’s clothing,” Rich Williams, higher education advocate for U.S. Public Interest Research Group Education Fund and lead author of the report, said in releasing the report. “Students think they can access their dollars freely, but instead their aid is being eaten up in fees.”

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News Release | U.S. PIRG | Higher Ed

BANKS SKIM MILLIONS IN FEES FROM STUDENT AID USING DEBIT-CARD-LINKED STUDENT IDS

Washington, D.C. – Over 9 million students are at risk for increased educational debt, due to bank-affiliated student debit cards that come with high fees, insufficient consumer protections, and few options.  Financial institutions now have affinity partnerships with almost 900 campuses nationwide, grafting bank products onto student IDs and other campus cards to become the primary recipient of billions in federal financial aid to distribute to students.

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News Release | U.S. PIRG | Health Care

Senate Approves S.3187 the Food and Drug Administration Safety and Innovation Act S. 3187

The Senate Passage of the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA) not Strong Enough to Ensure Sufficient Consumer Safety from Drugs and Medical devices

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News Release | U.S. PIRG | Higher Ed

There is no 'A' for effort

"It seems safe to say that the more than seven million students who will be taking out Stafford student loans for the next school year, join our disappointment that today the Senate could not pass a bill to keep interest rates from doubling on July 1.  

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News Release | U.S. PIRG | Safe Energy

U.S.PIRG Statement on the Resignation of NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko

We are deeply concerned by Chairman Gregory Jaczko’s resignation from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. While we may not have always seen eye to eye with the Chairman, he has been the lone advocate on the Commission for addressing some key nuclear safety concerns that put public health and safety at risk. 

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Report | CALPIRG Education Fund | Budget

Sunshine for California

Corporate tax avoidance leaves taxpaying households to pick up the tab for funding highways, schools, and other public structures. Much of the indirect costs of aggressive tax avoidance are also borne by investors who are unaware of these risky schemes. And everybody suffers when corporate profitability is determined by opportunities for tax evasion rather than efficiency or innovation.

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Report | U.S. PIRG Education Fund | Financial Reform

Halfway to the CFPB

The CFPB Implementation Team staff are making significant progress in their efforts to both build an effective agency and be ready to perform required functions by the transfer date (July 21, 2011).

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Blog Post | Food

FDA Sets Voluntary Limits of Antibiotic in Animal Feed, But What Does This Really Mean? | Nasima Hossain

The Food and Drug Administration announced last Wednesday that it had finalized a plan asking drug companies to voluntarily limit the use of certain antibiotics in animal feed.

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Blog Post | Consumer Protection

House launches latest "hypocritical" campaign to kill CFPB | Ed Mierzwinski

Today the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services will vote on a budget package that eliminates the budgetary independence of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) -- an effort to make it the only bank regulator subject to the political chicanery of the Appropriations process -- while simultaneously slashing its budget by 60%. Even the industry trade paper American Banker says: "Is GOP Push to Subject CFPB to Appropriations Hypocritical?"

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Blog Post | Consumer Protection

U.S., States Sue Apple, Publishers Over E-Book Price Conspiracy | Ed Mierzwinski

Today, the U.S. Attorney General and the Attorney Generals of Connecticut and Texas announced settlements with several publishers -- Hachette Book Group, Simon & Schuster and HarperCollins --over an alleged conspiracy with Apple and other publishers to attack Amazon's pricing model, secretly set e-book prices and thereby harm consumers. However, Apple and the publishers Macmillan and Penguin Group USA have refused to settle and are being sued by the agencies.

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Blog Post | Financial Reform

CFPB to announce mortgage servicing rules and other consumer news of the week | Ed Mierzwinski

(Update: phottos added.) Today, U.S. PIRG will be an invited guest as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau proposes new mortgage servicing rules to prevent, among other things, a recurrence of the robo-signing scandal. Among the other important news items of the week, in case you missed it, Ohio has made it harder for aggrieved consumers to obtain redress when ripped off.

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Blog Post | Democracy

Disempowered Bankers Start Super PAC, Reveal Plans for World Domination | Blair Bowie

While I am highly skeptical of the sentiment that "Congress is not afraid of bankers", given that banking lobbyists outnumber banking reform advocates 25-1 and that the Chairman of the Senate Financial Services Subcommittee seems to believe that "the banks own the place," the most ridiculous thing about members of the American Bankers Association's announcement of the industry's new Super PAC may be their willingness to reveal its strategy for skirting the non-coordination rules. This speaks volumes about how the industry thinks about its involvement in politics.

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Tools & Resources

  • FIGHT HIGH Rx COSTS
    Prescription drugs cost too much. Brand-name drug companies have been paying off generic drug makers to delay competition and keep prices high, and it's costing us billions. Together, we can stop them.
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  • YOUR TAX DOLLARS BECOME CORN SYRUP
    At a time when one-in-three kids is overweight or obese, over a billion taxpayer dollars go to high-fructose corn syrup and junk food ingredients.
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  • STOP TAX DODGERS
    Corporate tax avoidance cost taxpayers $100 billion last year. We're working to close the loopholes that allow companies to avoid paying the taxes they owe.
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  • Reclaim Democracy
    The Supreme Court's Citizens United decision ushered in an era of unprecedented spending by big money in our elections, but we're working to return our democracy back to the principle of "one person, one vote."
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