All around the country, newspapers’ consumer journalists are taking notice and reporting on the injustice of forced arbitration. Most recently, Matthew Hathaway, columnist for the St. Louis-Post Dispatch, posted a short article on the “The Savvy Consumer” blog. While Hathaway reports on the biases and unfairness of the predatory corporate practice, he’s a tad overly optimistic [...]
Posts Tagged ‘access to justice’
RAND study agrees: Improving patient safety will reduce malpractice claims
Posted in Health, tagged access to justice, medical malpractice, patient safety on April 15, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
For decades, Public Citizen has urged Congress and regulators to address the patient safety crisis. We told them that reducing medical errors would also reduce the claims and the associated costs. Today, the RAND Corporation – an independent, non-profit research firm – released a report confirming our assertions. They write: Our results showed a highly [...]
A consumer’s nightmare: A victim of forced arbitration tells his story
Posted in Congress, Consumer Protection, tagged access to justice, arbitration on March 8, 2010 | 1 Comment »
In 2007, John Perz (whose story has been covered by Consumer Reports, and who tells his own story here) bought a used car from a local lot in San Diego. The car had a rattle, but the salesman promised Perz that if he made an appointment, the rattle would be fixed free of charge. When [...]
They’ve got it all wrong…
Posted in Congress, Health, tagged access to justice, health care reform on February 24, 2010 | Comments Off
No longer are policy makers claiming that large leaps in health care costs are due to malpractice lawsuits. It is now the fear of litigation, according to a memorandum released by Public Citizen Doctors are finding it necessary to practice ‘defensive medicine,’ ordering excessive tests and procedures for patients. Let’s look at the facts: In [...]
Myth about Texas health care system debunked
Posted in Consumer Protection, Health, Texas, tagged access to justice on December 17, 2009 | 1 Comment »
You’ve probably heard members of Congress spouting off lately about how the imposition of caps on medical malpractice payouts in Texas has been so great. Well, those lawmakers are wrong. Public Citizen today released a report showing that the caps have failed to improve the health care system. Not only has the percentage of uninsured [...]
More than 125,500 tell Chamber of Commerce: Stop protecting rapists!
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged access to justice on December 17, 2009 | Comments Off
That’s right, more than 125,500 signed our petition to demand an end to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s lobbying against Sen. Franken’s (D-Minn.) amendment to bar defense contractors like Halliburton/KBR from forcing employees with sexual assault and discrimination claims into arbitration. Public Citizen, along with MoveOn.org, National Alliance to End Sexual Violence, Consumer Action, Workplace [...]
Cost of malpractice insurance steady or falling
Posted in Congress, Health, tagged access to justice, health and safety, medical malpractice on December 1, 2009 | Comments Off
New numbers from the Medical Liability Monitor show that 94 percent of medical malpractice insurance premiums have remained steady or dropped. Maggie Mertens over at NPR’s Shots Health Blog observes that the timing of this release is bad news for efforts to slip “tort reform” into the federal health care package. No doubt it will [...]

















