Consumer Law

CFPB Will Focus On Better Disclosures To Consumers

By Brian Wolfman

Elizabeth Warren is at the Treasury Department setting up the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. She sat down with the Washington Post's Michelle Singletary and explained that, at least at first, the CFPB's priority will be clearer and simpler disclosures to consumers and not telling lenders what products they can sell and at what interest rates. As Singletary explains:

But right now, Warren says her focus is on helping consumers understand how much they are paying for debt on everything from credit cards to mortgages. At a recent conference held by the Consumer Federation of America, Warren said the bureau's initial goal isn't to impose a series of "thou-shalt-not rules." Instead, she said that first on the agenda is providing consumers with better and shorter credit disclosures. Although this goal may sound so simple, it has the potential to greatly reduce the financial burden for people, because they don't fully comprehend how much their debt is really going to cost them. "There are a lot of financial institutions that make their money by keeping products confusing so the price isn't clear until it's way too late," Warren told me. "They make money by concealing risk, which means that people can't compare the products head to head."

Full post as published by CL&P Blog on December 13, 2010 (boomark / email).