Consumer Protection Law Commons^™

Consumer Harm Acts? An Economic Analysis Of Private Actions Under State Consumer Protection Acts, Henry N. Butler, Jason S. Johnston

Faculty Working Papers

State Consumer Protection Acts (CPAs) were adopted in the 1960s and 1970s to protect consumers from unfair and deceptive practices that would not be redressed but for the existence of the acts. In this sense, CPAs were designed to fill existing gaps in market, legal and regulatory protections of consumers. CPAs were designed to solve two simple economic problems: 1) individual consumers often do not have the incentive or means to pursue individual claims against mass marketers who engage in unfair and deceptive practices; and, 2) because of the difficulty of establishing elements of either common law fraud or breach …

Alternative Dispute Resolution In Small Consensual Litigation: Too Much Of A Good Thing?, Mark S. Simms

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

The evolution of equity in tort has brought about the use of alternative methods of dispute resolution in reaching settlements in mass tort cases: "Indeed, equity is a progressive force in the law. When formal adjudication cannot provide a plain, adequate, and complete remedy, the system of ADR should be flexible enough to deliver individualized justice." It appears, however, that the use of ADR is not always a prudent exercise of the court's power, nor is it always conducive to individual justice. This Note examines the Gray case, in which the court appointed a special master, thereby assigning one man …

Mandatory Arbitration For Customers But Not For Peers: A Study Of Arbitration Clauses In Consumer And Non-Consumer Contracts, Theodore Eisenberg, Geoffrey P. Miller, Emily Sherwin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

We conducted a study of contractual practices by well-known firms marketing consumer products, comparing the firms' consumer contracts with contracts the same firms negotiated with business peers. The frequency of arbitration clauses in consumer contracts has been studied before, as has the frequency of arbitration clauses in non-consumer contracts. Our study is the first to compare the use of arbitration clauses within firms, in different contractual contexts.

The results are striking: in our sample, mandatory arbitration clauses appeared in more than three-quarters of consumer contracts and less than one tenth of non-consumer contracts (excluding employment contracts) negotiated by the same …

Arbitration's Summer Soldiers: An Empirical Study Of Arbitration Clauses In Consumer And Nonconsumer Contracts, Theodore Eisenberg, Geoffrey P. Miller, Emily Sherwin

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

We provide the first study of varying use of arbitration clauses across contracts within the same firms. Using a sample of 26 consumer contracts and 164 nonconsumer contracts from large public corporations, we compared the use of arbitration clauses in firms' consumer and nonconsumer contracts. Over three-quarters of the consumer agreements provided for mandatory arbitration but less than 10% of the firms' material nonconsumer, nonemployment contracts included arbitration clauses. The absence of arbitration provisions in the vast majority of material contracts suggests that, ex ante, many firms value, even prefer, litigation over arbitration to resolve disputes with peers. Our data …

Arbitration Costs And Forum Accessibility: Empirical Evidence, Christopher R. Drahozal

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In this Article, written for this symposium issue on "Empirical Studies of Mandatory Arbitration," I examine the available empirical evidence on these two questions. I take "mandatory arbitration" to refer to pre-dispute arbitration clauses in consumer and employment (and maybe franchise) contracts. Accordingly, I limit my consideration of the empirical evidence to those types of contracts. I do not discuss empirical studies of international arbitrations, which almost always arise out of agreements between commercial entities. Nor do I discuss empirical studies of court-annexed arbitrations, which may not derive from party agreement and do not ordinarily proceed to a binding award.

What Process Is Due In The Adjudication Of Erisa Claims?, 40 J. Marshall L. Rev. 811 (2007), Mark D. Debofsky

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Complete Property Right Amendment, John H. Ryskamp

ExpressO

The trend of the eminent domain reform and "Kelo plus" initiatives is toward a comprehensive Constitutional property right incorporating the elements of level of review, nature of government action, and extent of compensation. This article contains a draft amendment which reflects these concerns.

Bond Repudiation, Tax Codes, The Appropriations Process And Restitution Post-Eminent Domain Reform, John H. Ryskamp

ExpressO

This brief comment suggests where the anti-eminent domain movement might be heading next.

Review Essay: Using All Available Information, Max Huffman

ExpressO

This is a review essay entitled “Using All Available Information,” in which I review and comment on Justice Stephen Breyer’s new book, Active Liberty: Interpreting Our Democratic Constitution, published in September 2005. Justice Breyer’s book, adapted from the Tanner Lectures given in 2005 at Harvard Law School, serves partly as a response to Justice Scalia’s 1997 volume A Matter of Interpretation: Federal Courts and the Law. I review Justice Breyer’s book in part by comparison to and contrast with Justice Scalia’s. I propose that much about Justice Breyer’s interpretive philosophy, which centers on determining the “purposes” of texts and interpreting …

The New Judicial Hostility To Arbitration: Unconscionability And Agreements To Arbitrate, Steven J. Burton

ExpressO

Many, many contract disputes are now being settled by arbitration instead of litigation. The United States Supreme Court strongly favors the enforcement of agreements to arbitrate that fall within the Federal Arbitration Act. This Article shows that many lower courts, however, are using the contract unconscionability doctrine to refuse enforcement of agreements to arbitrate. It argues (1) that many such lower court decisions should be pre-empted by the Federal Arbitration Act, and (2) that lower courts should give due weight to the federal policy favoring arbitration when deciding whether to enforce an agreement to arbitrate.

Improving The Construction And Litigation Resolution Process: The 2005 Amendments To The Washington Condominium Act Are A Win-Win For Homeowners And Developers, Mark F. O'Donnell, David E. Chawes

Seattle University Law Review

On August 1, 2005, significant amendments to the Washington Condominium Act (WCA) became effective. These amendments were intended to substantially reduce water infiltration in multiunit residential buildings and to simplify the condominium construction dispute resolution process. The heart of the amendments is the implementation of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) procedures, as well as fee-shiftingprovisions which require the non-prevailing party to pay the attorney fees and costs of the prevailing party. A decade of lawsuits brought under the WCA by condominium owners associations against builders and developers, and in turn by builders against subcontractors, alleging defects in the ability of the …

Breaking The Bank: Revisiting Central Bank Of Denver After Enron And Sarbanes-Oxley, Celia Taylor

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

Finding The Contract In Contracts For Law, Forum, And Arbitration, William John Woodward

ExpressO

Contract provisions specifying the law or forum (either judicial or arbitration) have begun appearing in litigated cases, as businesses have pressed many courts for their enforcement against consumers. In at least some of the cases, enforcement of a choice of law provision results in the displacement of the consumer’s home state protection by the lesser consumer protection of the State of the form drafter’s choosing. This phenomenon raises serious problems of federalism and local control of consumer protection. But while considerable scholarly attention has been lavished on so-called “mandatory arbitration” in this context, much less has attempted to improve our …

The High Cost Of Mandatory Consumer Arbitration, Mark E. Budnitz

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

Using Arbitration To Eliminate Consumer Class Actions: Efficient Business Practice Or Unconscionable Abuse?, Jean R. Sternlight, Elizabeth J. Jensen

Scholarly Works

Companies are increasingly drafting arbitration clauses worded to prevent consumers from bringing class actions against them in either litigation or arbitration. If one looks at the form contracts she receives regarding her credit card, cellular phone, land phone, insurance policies, mortgage, and so forth, most likely, the majority of those contracts include arbitration clauses, and many of those include prohibitions on class actions. Companies are seeking to use these clauses to shield themselves from class action liability, either in court or in arbitration.

This article argues that while the unconscionability doctrine offers some protections, case-by-case adjudication is a costly means …

Mass Toxic Tort Litigation And Class Action Rule Reform In The United States, Jason L. Betts

ExpressO

The paper advances the proposition that mass toxic tort litigation has been the predominant driver of class action rule reform in the Unites States. Through three distinct phases of proposals to reform Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the judicial and academic attitude to the certification of mass toxic torts has influenced the reform debate in radically different ways – initially by providing the catalyst for efforts to reform Rule 23; then as a dampener against significant reforms to Rule 23 in the wake of mass toxic tort “settlement-only” classes; and ultimately as an explanation for the …

Creating A Market For Justice; A Market Incentive Solution To Regulating The Playing Field: Judicial Deference, Judicial Review, Due Process, And Fair Play In Online Consumer Arbitration, Llewellyn Joseph Gibbons

Northwestern Journal of International Law & Business

Swindlers, purveyors of substandard products or services, and honest traders unable to perform their agreements can access the global market as easily as legitimate and capable businesses. The impersonal nature of e-commerce makes it more difficult for traders to discern a merchant or transaction that will not satisfy their expectations. This article analyzes procedural due process concerns as an element of arbitration in online dispute resolution ("ODR") in business-to-consumer ("B2C") e-commerce. B2C e-commerce will be worth an estimated $250 billion by the end of 2003, but one factor hindering its growth is the lack of effective dispute resolution. For reasons …

Representing The Unrepresented In Class Action Settlements, Brian Wolfman

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Class actions are important and useful both to deter wrongful conduct and to provide compensation for injured plaintiffs. In complex cases, however, the existing class action structure falters. In this article, Messrs. Wolfman and Morrison argue that in "settlement class actions" the current class action rules do not adequately protect class members whose interests do not coincide with those of the class representatives and the class attorneys. Through a survey of recent, prominent settlement class actions, the authors show that the current system does not fairly treat subgroups in a class with respect to matters as diverse as future injury, …

Arbitration Of Disputes Between Consumers And Financial Institutions: A Serious Threat To Consumer Protection, Mark E. Budnitz

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

Consumer Redress Through Alternative Dispute Resolution And Small Claims Court: Theory And Practice, David S. Cohen

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

There are significant difficulties in providing consumers with redress because dispute resolution costs are high relative to the sums being sought. Consumers also manifest a reluctance to enter legal processes for other reasons. This prompted the creation of user-friendly small claims courts and encouraged the discussion and sometimes the use of non-judicial, alternative dispute resolution forums for addressing consumer redress. This paper explores the theoretical and practical distinction between these two types of dispute resolution forums. The practical differences are examined on the basis of observation of both types of forums and discussions with practitioners of alternative dispute resolution.

The …

Trial By Jury

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Rent Control Price Fixing: Another Look At The Emperor's New Clothes, Robert N. Markle

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.