Consumer protection

“ In order to promote the interests of consumers and to ensure a high level of consumer protection, the Union shall contribute to protecting the health, safety and economic interests of consumers, as well as to promoting their right to information, education and to organise themselves in order to safeguard their interests. ”

“ Consumer education helps every American who enters the marketplace. When making a purchase, consumers should know their rights and should learn about goods and services before they buy. This knowledge allows consumers to make sound decisions and protects families and individuals from fraud and abuse. Consumer vigilance also prevents problems before they arise. During National Consumer Protection Week, we highlight consumer education efforts to help Americans make wise decisions. ”

“ But of greatest importance to consumers and private enterprise is protection against the marketing of goods that are hazardous to health or life, a fair hearing of complaints with appropriate remedies where justified, and dutiful consideration of consumer concerns at all levels of government. ”

“ There shall be an organisation for the protection of consumers, to be established as an entity independent from State agencies and consisting of representatives of consumers, which shall have the duties to give opinions for assisting considerations of State agencies in connection with the making and enforcement of laws and bylaws, give opinions in connection with the determination of measures for consumer protection and examine as well as report the performance or omission of acts protecting consumers. ”

“ The Federal Trade Commission and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, our Nation’s consumer protection agencies, in coordination with law enforcement across the country, fight predatory practices and privacy violations day in and day out, with investigations, law enforcement actions, and free, actionable, plain-language consumer education resources. ”

“ This extraordinary economic machine works most efficiently when we as consumers are at the controls: when our choices and decisions, our requirements and collective will determine the direction and the workings of the marketplace. But individuals and the Nation's economy suffer when products and services are ineffective, inferior, or unsafe; when prices are unfair; and when consumer needs for reliable information and protection are unmet. ”

“ I shall for this argument assume it as demonstrated that the increase of price which protection makes is paid by the consumer. This suggests the first great objection to protection, that it compels the consumer to pay more for goods than they are really worth, ostensibly to help the business of a producer. Now consumers constitute the vast majority of the people. The producers of protected articles are few in comparison with them. It is true that most men are both producers and consumers. ”

“ All persons shall have the right of access to goods and services of good quality, as well as to adequate and non-misleading information concerning the contents and characteristics of the products and services they consume, to freedom of choice and to fair and dignified treatment. The mechanisms necessary to guarantee these rights, the standards of quality and quantity for goods and services, consumer protection procedures, compensation for damages caused and appropriate penalties for the violation of these rights shall be established by law. ”

“ It is quite probable that beneficial modifications of the system may be made without impairing its efficacy. But to make it fulfil the purposes of its institution, the measure of protection ought to be adequate. If it be not, all interests will be injuriously affected. The manufacturer, crippled in his exertions, will produce less perfect and dearer fabrics, and the consumer will feel the consequence. This is the spirit, and these are the principles only, on which it seems to me that a settlement of the great question can be made, satisfactorily to all parts of our union. ”

“ I call upon Government officials, industry leaders, and advocates across the Nation to provide our citizens with information about consumer rights, and I encourage all Americans to take a proactive role in strengthening our economy. ”

“ All is sheer loss to the country as well as to the consumer.
Of the industries in a country some are said to “need protection” and others not—that is, those industries which are carried on at a relative disadvantage are the only ones which need protection in order that they may continue in operation. ”

“ But protection, as a theory, certainly is not directly responsible for all the indifference to the consumer. Honest and consistent protection, assuming that there may be such, would not in every case forbid the consumer to purchase cheaply abroad ”

“ So with De Laines, Counterpanes, Brussels Carpetings and fabrics generally; and yet Americans will talk as though the encouragement given by protective Duties to home Manufacturers were given at the expense of our consumers. Vainly are they challenged from day to day to name one single article whereof the production has been transplanted from Europe to America through Protection, which has not thereby been materially cheapened to the American consumer; it suits them better to assume that the duty is a tax on the consumer than to examine the case and admit the truth. ”

“ The website also includes information on home foreclosure, identity theft, and protecting businesses. Working together, consumers, businesses, and Government can strengthen our robust free market for the benefit of all Americans. ”

“ Public interest similarly demands one prompt specific action in protection of the general consumer. The Food and Drug Administration should be authorized to continue its established and necessary program of factory inspections. ”

“ And one should further note the rising Protection policy of a hundred years, under which the trusts flourished without any notable increase of wages to the local consumer, and the local consumer paid uniformly higher prices than those paid by foreigners for the same grade of goods, often the very same goods made here and shipped abroad. ”

“ Working with our trading partners, industry, and consumer advocates, we are extending traditional consumer protections to the arena of electronic commerce. Without imposing burdensome regulations that might stifle growth and innovation, we have offered incentives to online companies to give consumers the protections they need to conduct business on the Internet with security and confidence. ”

“ Competition is not only the basis of protection to the consumer but is the incentive to progress. ”

“ Buyers and sellers alike should recognize the basic rights of consumers: the right to choice among products and services; the right to information enabling them to make sound purchases; the right to healthful and safe products; the right to be heard when products do not meet standards. Government at all levels will continue its responsible stewardship of consumer safety as well as its vigorous prosecution of illegal and deceptive practices. ”

“ National Consumers Week 1987 is dedicated to reminding us that the exercise of these rights helps to maintain the vigor of our economic system-creating positive pressure for better products, services, and warranties-and that consumer education is a lifelong process. ”

“ I urge consumers, businesses, educators, community organizations, labor unions, the media, and government officials to identify, emphasize, and promote activities during National Consumers Week that draw attention to the consumer's rights under the Constitution. ”

“ In this same process of evolution we are keeping before us the objectives of protecting, on the one hand, industry against chiselers within its own ranks, and, on the other hand, the consumer through the maintenance of reasonable competition for the prevention of the unfair sky-rocketing of retail prices. ”

“ When we cease to have competition at home and the law prohibits competition from abroad by protecting profits, there is no relief for the consumer except to cry out for government regulation. To my mind, there is no more reason or justice in the government attempting to protect the profits of the manufacturers and producers of this country than here would be to protect the profits of the merchant or the lawyer, the banker or the farmer, or the wages of the laboring man. ”

“ They also deserve security for any personal information provided during the conduct of a transaction, whether in person or on the Internet. As we observe National Consumer Week, I urge the American people to learn more about their rights as responsible consumers and to reward those businesses that continue to give them a fair shake. ”

“ In order to protect consumers, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Justice, the Consumer Federation of America, the American Association of Retired Persons, the National Association of Consumer Agency Administrators, and the National Association of Attorneys General have joined forces to inform Americans about their rights as home shoppers, about merchant responsibilities, and about how to enjoy safely the benefits of shopping from home. ”

“ We will improve consumption policies and the consumption environment. We will accelerate the project to encourage retailers to open stores in more townships and villages, and encourage commercial chains to open more outlets in rural areas. We will intensify the development of consumption facilities and service networks in both urban and rural areas, rectify order in the market, and safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of consumers. We will promptly work out and introduce policies and measures to encourage consumption, and vigorously develop consumer credit. ”

“ It is universally conceded that combinations which engross or control the market of any particular kind of merchandise or commodity necessary to the general community, by suppressing natural and ordinary competition, whereby prices are unduly enhanced to the general consumer, are obnoxious not only to the common law but also to the public welfare. ”

“ Having given the manufacturer the advantage of a free command, without any impost, of the raw materials which enter into his fabrics, he should call upon the manufacturers of the three great articles which entered into consumption as the clothing of the great body of the community, to give a proof of the sincerity of their convictions as to the impolicy of protective duties, by consenting to relax the protection on their manufactures. ”

“ We must also act to prevent the deception of the American consumer--requiring all packages to state clearly and truthfully their contents--all interest and credit charges to be fully revealed--and keeping harmful drugs and cosmetics away from our stores. ”

“ I urge all business persons, educators, members of the professions, public officials, consumer leaders, and the media to observe this week by emphasizing and promoting the fundamental importance of consumer rights in our marketplace. ”

“ In landholding and agriculture, as in manufacturing and trade, government has thus stepped in to prevent what would have been the effect of mere free competition, and to bring about a distribution and use of the land which have seemed more desirable.
75. Government Sanitary Control.—In the field of buying and selling the hand of government has been most felt in provisions for the health of the consumer of various articles. Laws against adulteration have been passed, and a code of supervision, registry, and enforcement constructed. ”

“ I call upon all Americans to observe this day by working with safety, health, and consumer agencies and other appropriate community organizations to organize and conduct local round-ups of dangerous and defective consumer products and to warn parents, child care providers, and the general public about the hazards of using recalled consumer products. ”

“ The right to this release has been claimed by workers and by small enterprisers, especially by retail merchandisers, over centuries, and finds contemporary expression in legislation in three-quarters of the States. The nature of the injury which must be balanced against it is the economic disadvantage to the enterpriser, and the inconvenience to the consumer, which Sunday regulations impose upon those who choose to adhere to the Sabbatarian tenets of their faith. ”

“ Such a dependent society must exact greater care than in more simple days and must require from manufacturers or producers increased integrity and caution as the only protection of its safety and well-being. ”

“ All duty paid upon such articles goes directly to the cost of the article when manufactured here, and must be paid for by the consumers. These duties not only come from the consumers at home, but act as a protection to foreign manufacturers of the same completed articles in our own and distant markets. ”

“ The theme for this year's observance of National Consumers Week, "Today's Choices -- Tomorrow's Opportunities," underscores the importance of decisions made by individual consumers. What people buy, where, and how often helps to determine the shape of the marketplace, be it at the local or the international level. Here in the United States, we have traditionally relied on the ability of consumers and private industry to balance each other's needs and interests in the marketplace, with government intervening only to ensure fairness and the safety of goods and services. ”

“ The State shall facilitate the acquisition by farmers of agricultural implements. (3) The protection of persons engaged in agriculture against acts of God shall be regulated by law. Article 65: Protection of Consumers The State shall take protective and enlightening measures for the consumers. It shall encourage consumers to take steps protecting themselves. ”