Give It a New Name

“Honesty is the best policy, when there is money in it.” — Mark Twain

If government–or at least government regulators, apparatchiks and other place-holders–get their way, it’s going to be a lot easier to sue your bank. Just what this country needs. More litigation.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau wants to ban arbitration clauses between you and your bank, credit card company and other finance outfits. Those clauses are often written into your agreements with the lenders and credit companies so that in case of disputes, you’d go to arbitration instead of the courtroom. This has worked for many people for many years. In fact, it’s worked for so many people and for so many years that one has to wonder what prompted the Consum. Fin. Pro. Bureau to change everything.

Well, not everything. Just for folks who want to create class-action lawsuits. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau wants to protect consumers’ finances, but let’s not go nuts. Companies would still make a single customer go to arbitration. But when customers want to lawyer-up as a group, then they could go to the courts.

If you hear applause and cheers, that’s the class-action lawyer shop down the street. They just might be seeing big paydays on the horizon.

Of course the money they hope to pocket won’t come out of thin air. The banks and credit companies will have to pass on the cost to you, Gentle Reader, every time you open an account. The banks have their own lawyers, and in order to stay in business they’ll have to figure out how much more to charge you to pay for future lawsuits.

The good news is that the financial industry and a bunch of lobbying groups working for it have announced quite clearly that they’ll fight this (very) government idea from the start:

“Arbitration has long provided a faster, better, and more cost-effective means of addressing consumer disputes than litigation or class-action lawsuits,” a banker type told the papers. “The real winners of today’s proposal are trial attorneys, not consumers.”

We must have missed the uproar created by all of the people who wanted to sue their banks but were thwarted by arbitration clauses. But fish gotta swim, government agencies have to push paper. But why must this particular government continually be on the side of driving up the costs for its citizens?

At least the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau could be honest with We the People. How about renaming this proposal the Class-Action Lawyers’ Payday Act instead?

Editorial on 05/10/2016

Source: www.arkansasonline.com www.arkansasonline.com

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