About MASSPIRG
MASSPIRG FIGHTS FOR THE PUBLIC—MASSPIRG Executive Director Janet Domenitz testifying before the legislative committee considering the Updated Bottle Bill, urging lawmakers to stand with the public instead of siding with the beverage and bottling industries, and to vote to update the commonwealth's most sucessful recycling program.
An Independent Voice For Consumers
MASSPIRG is a consumer group that stands up to powerful interests whenever they threaten our health and safety, our financial security or our right to fully participate in our democratic society.
Since 1972, we’ve stood up for consumers, countering the influence of big banks, insurers, chemical manufacturers and other powerful special interests.
OUR TOP PRIORITIES
Using the time-tested tools of investigative research, media exposés, grassroots organizing, advocacy and litigation, MASSPIRG stands up to powerful interests and delivers concrete results.
UPDATE THE BOTTLE BILL
For more than 30 years, Executive Director Janet Domenitz has fought to make Massachusetts healthier and more sustainable. By updating the Bottle Bill, we can keep an extra billion bottles from being buried and burned every year. >LEARN MORE
KEEP MASS ON TRACK
We won more federal money for high-speed rail in New England, and we organized the public to convince the legislature to limit fare hikes and service cuts on the T. >LEARN MORE
REINING IN WALL STREET
After the financial crisis, we spearheaded the fight to create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which recently forced Capital One to pay back $140 million in unfair credit card fees to consumers. >LEARN MORE
PROTECTING CONSUMERS
Our toy safety reports and lab research have led to recalls of more than 150 toxic or dangerous toys, and our advocates have pushed to keep toxic chemicals out of all consumer products.>LEARN MORE
What's New
The American Farm Bureau Federation, which represents almost 6 million member families across the United States, voted decisively yesterday to endorse their members’ ability to fix their equipment when it breaks. In doing so, they set clear guidelines on what kind of policy they think will solve the problem.
Statement: New Jersey just took a massive step on clean transportation, Massachusetts should be next
New Jersey passed groundbreaking legislation to clean up the state's transportatation system, while similar legislation remains pending in the Massachusetts State House.
In support of a report by colleagues from the Norwegian Consumer Council on whether the data sharing and privacy practices of a number of dating and other smartphone apps were in compliance with European privacy rules (GDPR) or the new California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), U.S. PIRG and other leading groups sent joint letters to key policymakers, including the California, Oregon and TexaS Attorneys General, the Federal Trade Commission and all members of the U.S. House and Senate.
A new statewide program called Massachusetts SWIG will protect kids from lead in their school drinking water, a growing problem across Massachusetts. The state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and the state treasurer are launching SWIG, which stands for “school water improvement grants,” to provide schools with water filling stations certified to remove lead and provide free water testing for those schools that have yet to test their water.
Last week, CFPB Director Kathy Kraninger appointed four lawyers and professors to a "Taskforce on Federal Consumer Law." To my knowledge, none have worked for consumer protection organizations yet all have worked as industry consultants or been aligned with industry views, although all have previous government experience. I am aware of several distinguished professors with CFPB experience who were rejected. Incredibly, the announcement of this better-described "Task Farce" claimed inspiration from a distinguished bi-partisan commission established by the Consumer Credit Protection Act in 1968."
Consumer Protection
New federal bill will make it easier for consumers to know about unsafe, even deadly products
If you had a product in your home that the government knew could cause injury or death, you'd expect the government to warn you, right? Surprisingly, that's not the case for the Consumer Product Safety Commission. The "Safety Hazard and Recall Efficiency Information Act" seeks to change that.
Consumer Protection
The Trump administration's Consumer Bureau just appointed a task "farce" on consumer law
The Trump administration's Consumer Financial Protection Bureau just appointed a new task force on consumer law — but according to senior director of PIRG's federal consumer program, Ed Mierzwinski, this task force isn't set up to be on the side of consumers. "It is a task farce," he said.
Democracy
Time tells: Massachusetts' online voter registration program is increasing enrollment.
Massachusetts began its online voter registration program four years ago. Since then, it has become the most popular way to register, accounting for more than half of the registration forms received by the state between 2016 and 2018.
Transportation
12 states just announced plans to transform our transportation system
Transportation is the single largest source of carbon emissions in the U.S.—but Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia and Washington, D.C., just released a plan to change that, called the Transportation Climate Initiative.
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Your donation supports MASSPIRG's work to stand up for consumers on the issues that matter, especially when powerful interests are blocking progress.