Blog de Dunlap: A story about a toaster

Danielle,

I have July 21st circled on my calendar almost as many times as my wedding anniversary and my grandkids' birthdays.

That's because today marks the 10th anniversary since the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) opened for business — exactly one year after President Obama signed the Dodd-Frank Act into law. And over the last decade, the CFPB has put billions of dollars back in the pockets of people cheated by the financial industry.

The story starts one morning in the 1970s, when I forgot about a few pieces of bread I'd left in the toaster oven — and nearly set my kitchen on fire.

Back then, our toaster oven had an on-off switch and that was it. At some point, someone had the bright idea of adding a timer and automatic shut-off. This simple change made it a whole lot harder for distracted mothers, or anyone else, to leave it running until it set the kitchen on fire.

Thirty years later, while working on an article about how the government could protect consumers from predatory financial companies, I thought about those old toaster ovens.

By then, it was all but impossible to buy a toaster that had a one-in-five chance of bursting into flames and burning down your house. A government agency monitored toasters for basic safety, just like the government kept lead paint out of children's toys and rat poison out of medicine.

But it was possible to refinance a home with a mortgage that had a one-in-five chance of costing a family their home and putting them out on the street. In fact, it wasn't just possible: Those mortgages were bursting into flames all over the country.

I had a plan for how we could change the rules with a structural fix: A new government agency whose sole mission was to look out for consumers. They could serve as the cop on the beat and could make sure that financial companies followed some clear, commonsense rules. No tricks hidden in the fine print, no traps buried in complex legalese.

And after the financial crisis, the plan didn't seem so pie-in-the-sky. So we got organized.

Labor unions like the AFL-CIO and SEIU joined our fight to protect working people. Civil rights organizations like the NAACP and National Council of La Raza jumped in (Black and Latino families had been targeted with some of the very worst subprime mortgages). And groups like the AARP and Consumers Union said this was their fight, too.

Of course, the giant financial institutions were dead set against an agency whose job was to get the tricks and traps out of the fine print of financial products. They spent millions lobbying against financial reform and the new consumer agency.

It was David-versus-Goliath all the way. And we won.

The Bureau transformed the market for financial services by placing new rules on mortgages, credit cards, checking accounts, prepaid cards, and payday loans to clean up some of the most predatory practices and knock bad actors out of the industry altogether.

And in the 10 years since it's been created, this little agency has handled over 1 million complaints and forced big financial institutions to return nearly $13 billion directly to people who were cheated.

Danielle, the CFPB is a powerful example of what we can accomplish when we fight together. We'll keep making plans, we'll keep getting organized, and we'll make big, structural change to get Washington working for working people — not just for the rich and powerful.

But no one makes it happen on their own. It takes a grassroots movement — you and me working together, and fighting side by side with people all over the country.

In honor of the CFPB's birthday, will you chip in $15 toward our re-election campaign so I can keep holding the big banks accountable in the Senate – and help Democrats protect our majorities in the House and Senate in 2022?

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I'm ready to fight with every bone in my body, and I hope you'll stay in the fight too.

Thanks for being a part of this,

Elizabeth

Grassroots donors like you are powering the fight for big, structural change.

If you can, will you chip in $15 or whatever makes sense right now to help re-elect Elizabeth and put more Warren Democrats in office across the country?

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