News

MSNBC, New York Times Cite Democracy Role in CFPB Creation

In the wake of the Senate’s confirmation of Richard Cordray as the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), media outlets reporting on the story cited the role Democracy played in the creation of the agency.

By Elbert Ventura

In the wake of the Senate’s confirmation of Richard Cordray as the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB)—a move that essentially cleared away the last obstacles to the agency’s operations—media outlets reporting on the story cited the role Democracy played in the creation of the agency. Democracy published the essay by Elizabeth Warren that first introduced the idea of such an agency in its Summer 2007 issue.

In a July 17 story in The New York Times, Binyamin Applebaum cited Democracy‘s Summer 2007 issue as the birthplace of the idea for a CFPB. “Ms. Warren proposed the creation of a federal agency to protect consumers of financial products in a 2007 article, memorably arguing that the government put more effort into ensuring the safety of toaster ovens than the safety of mortgage loans,” wrote Applebaum. “The idea resonated with Mr. Obama and his senior advisers, and it became a centerpiece of the administration’s proposal to overhaul financial regulation.”

On the July 16 episode of “All In with Chris Hayes,” host Chris Hayes interviewed Sen. Warren and noted that her original essay appeared in a “very, very small policy journal called Democracy that still exists and turns out great stuff.” Watch the video below:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Elbert Ventura is an associate editor at The Chronicle Review.

Also by this author

They’ll Always Have Welfare

Click to

View Comments

blog comments powered by Disqus