They’re cleaner, healthier and often cheaper in the long-term. Tell our legislators to act now to make every school and transit bus electric by 2030.
They’re cleaner, healthier and often cheaper in the long-term. Tell our legislators to act now to make every school and transit bus electric by 2030.
Consumer Protection
Food recall failure
Most grocery store chains are not warning their customers about dangerous food recalls. Find out if your store makes the grade.
Public Health
Massachusetts unveils new program to protect kids from lead poisoning
On Jan. 14, Massachusetts launched a new program to get the lead out of school drinking water. The School Water Improvement Grants program (SWIG) will provide schools with water filling stations certified to remove lead, and will conduct water testing for schools that have not yet been tested.
Democracy
A somber anniversary: 10 years after the Citizens United decision
January 15th marked the 10th anniversary of the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling, widely blamed for opening the floodgates to special interest spending in our elections. U.S. legislators joined PIRG and other pro-democracy organizations to decry the ongoing harm caused by the ruling—and to highlight the growth of the pro-reform movement.
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.
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News & Research
Report | MASSPIRG Education Fund
Americans are not hearing about food recalls, and that communication breakdown is having serious repercussions for public health. For example, less than two years ago, people kept getting sick for months after 12 million pounds of Salmonella-contaminated beef was recalled. The pattern has repeated for other recalls even when news outlets have publicized warnings from food safety agencies.
A new report finds that most grocery stores -- which should be some of the best sources for consumers to learn about recalls -- don’t make it easy for consumers to find. MASSPIRG Education Fund’s Food Recall Failure: Will your supermarket warn you about hazardous food? scorecard gave a failing grade to 84 percent of the nation’s 26 largest supermarket chains. Chains receiving a failing grade include Stop and Shop, Whole Foods, Wegmans, and Walmart.
News Release | MASSPIRG Education Fund
Boston -- Americans are not hearing about food recalls, and that communication breakdown is having serious repercussions for public health. For example, less than two years ago, people kept getting sick for months after 12 million pounds of Salmonella-contaminated beef was recalled. The pattern has repeated for other recalls even when news outlets have publicized warnings from food safety agencies.
News Release | U.S. PIRG
Congress must hold companies accountable for failing to protect condumers' confidential information.
Blog Post
It’s common-sense: If something you own breaks, you should be able to fix it. But manufacturers don’t see it that way. Instead, they use a set of tactics to block independent repair because they want consumers to have to come to them to do repairs. Right to Repair made considerable progress in 2019, and just a little over a month into 2020, we’re seeing continued momentum.
News Release | MASSPIRG
Acting shortly before a committee deadline that could have killed the bill, the Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure Joint Committee gave a favorable report to the Digital Right to Repair Act. If the bill ultimately becomes law, it would combat manufacturers’ near-monopoly on repair by giving the public access to the parts, tools and information needed to fix broken digital devices.
RESOURCE
Get consumer tips
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