Home

Welcome to CALPIRG

What's New

All
News
Milestones
Reports
Blog

Media Hit | Consumer Protection

See which airlines get the most and least complaints

Spirit Airlines generated the most complaints per 100,000 passengers and Southwest the least, according to a study released Thursday.

The study, by the CALPIRG Education Fund, analyzed complaint data for 13 large domestic airlines lodged with the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Aviation Consumer Protection Division from 2009 through 2013. It found that most complaints are about delayed or canceled flights.

News Release | CALPIRG | Health Care

Health Insurance Rate Review Has Saved Californians $349 Million

This report looks at the impacts and effects of the first three years of health insurance rate review in California, and makes policy recommendations to strengthen and expand the process to more extensively protect Californians from unjustified health insurance premium hikes.

Report | CALPIRG | Health Care

California Health Insurance Rate Review

In its first three years, health insurance rate review in California has saved consumers and small businesses $349 million.

Report | CALPIRG | Tax

Picking Up the Tab: Average Citizens and Small Businesses Pay the Price for Offshore Tax Havens

New report finds that corporate abuse of offshore tax havens is costing Californians billions of dollars, and individual taxpayers and smal business owners are the ones who end up footing th ebill

Media Hit | Budget

California gets an “F” for transparency of government spending

California receives an F when it comes to government spending transparency, according to a study by the California Public Interest Research Group Education Fund.

Pages

Media Hit | Consumer Protection

See which airlines get the most and least complaints

Spirit Airlines generated the most complaints per 100,000 passengers and Southwest the least, according to a study released Thursday.

The study, by the CALPIRG Education Fund, analyzed complaint data for 13 large domestic airlines lodged with the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Aviation Consumer Protection Division from 2009 through 2013. It found that most complaints are about delayed or canceled flights.

News Release | CALPIRG | Health Care

Health Insurance Rate Review Has Saved Californians $349 Million

This report looks at the impacts and effects of the first three years of health insurance rate review in California, and makes policy recommendations to strengthen and expand the process to more extensively protect Californians from unjustified health insurance premium hikes.

Media Hit | Budget

California gets an “F” for transparency of government spending

California receives an F when it comes to government spending transparency, according to a study by the California Public Interest Research Group Education Fund.

News Release | CALPIRG Education Fund | Consumer Protection

Report: Spirit is Most Complained-About Airline

SACRAMENTO — Spirit Airlines passengers are most likely to complain about their experience, according to a report released today by the CALPIRG Education Fund. Among major airlines, Spirit generates the most complaints for its size and generates an increasing number of complaints each year. Other most-complained about firms include Frontier Airlines, United Airlines, and American Airlines.

News Release | CALPIRG Education Fund | Budget

California Receives an “F” in Annual Report on Transparency of Government Spending

SACRAMENTO — California received an F when it comes to government spending transparency, according to “Following the Money 2014: How the 50 States Rate in Providing Online Access to Government Spending Data,” the fifth annual report of its kind by the California Public Interest Research Group Education Fund.

Pages

Result | Health Care

New Health Care Marketplace Opens

We helped win real reforms that led to the creation of a new California health care marketplace, Covered California. New health insurance options are now available to small businesses and individuals that could save consumers a lot of money. Consumers are able to make choices based not only on cost, and access to care, but the quality of that care.

Result | Democracy

CALPIRG Helps Register 40,000 New Voters

In 2012, CALPIRG worked with college campuses across the state to ensure that both online and paper voter registration options were made available to students. Through our outreach, we helped to register more than 40,000 young Californians to vote.

Result | Democracy

Legislature Passes Resolution Against Citizens United

More than 50,000 Californians, many of them CALPIRG members, joined our call to put our state on record in opposition to the Supreme Court ruling that opened the floodgates to a torrent of Super PAC-fueled campaign spending. The California Legislature passed our resolution — joining more than a dozen other states — calling for a constitutional amendment that would overturn the Citizens United decision.

Result | Health Care

Pro-consumer Health Care Reform

CALPIRG’s advocacy helped ensure the health care law will bring down costs by setting up a competitive health insurance marketplace. In 2010, California became the first state in the country to begin setting up our state health insurance exchange.

Result | Health Care

Fighting To Make Health Care Affordable

Thanks to a new CALPIRG-backed law, insurance companies actually have to justify rate hikes to the public, bringing some much-needed accountability. Thanks in part to the new law — and public pressure, including 1,200 public comments from CALPIRG supporters — Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of California both backed off of double-digit rate hikes.

Pages

Report | CALPIRG | Health Care

California Health Insurance Rate Review

In its first three years, health insurance rate review in California has saved consumers and small businesses $349 million.

Report | CALPIRG | Tax

Picking Up the Tab: Average Citizens and Small Businesses Pay the Price for Offshore Tax Havens

New report finds that corporate abuse of offshore tax havens is costing Californians billions of dollars, and individual taxpayers and smal business owners are the ones who end up footing th ebill

Report | CALPIRG Education Fund | Consumer Protection

The Unfriendly Skies

It seems as if every consumer has an airline problem story—how they were trapped on the tarmac, tricked by fees, missed their connection, or lost their bag. What many consumers don’t know is that they have a number of new rights as well as a right to complain, both to the airline and to the government. This report tracks five years of consumer complaints and highlights which airlines received the most complaints and what kinds of complaints were most common.

Report | CALPIRG Education Fund | Budget

Following the Money 2014

California received an F when it comes to government spending transparency, according to “Following the Money 2014: How the 50 States Rate in Providing Online Access to Government Spending Data,” the fifth annual report of its kind by the California Public Interest Research Group Education Fund.

Report | CALPIRG | Public Health

CALPIRG Supports State Bill to Limit Use of Antibiotics in Farm Animals

Since they were developed in the 1940s, antibiotics have been one of the most important tools in modern medicine to protect our health.

Pages

Blog Post | Consumer Protection

FTC Chairwoman Answers Privacy Questions on Reddit | Jon Fox

Maureen Ohlhausen, the newly appointed FTC Commissioner, took questions on a broad range of privacy issues on Reddit, a user-generated interactive news website.

Add new comment

Blog Post | Budget

California Senate Passes Bill to reform California's Enterprise Zone program | Garo Manjikian

Yesterday the Senate took a major step to reform California Enterprise Zone program by passing AB 93 a bill strongly backed by Gov. Jerry Brown.

Add new comment

Blog Post | Consumer Protection, Democracy

Coming together, pushing back | Jon Fox

Observations from the annual National Conference on Media Reform.

Add new comment

Blog Post | Public Health, Health Care

Supreme Court hears arguments on ‘Pay for Delay’ Case

Big Pharma’s anti-competitive practice costs consumers $3.5 billion a year. The 1984 Hatch-Waxman Act was originally intended to increase the availability of generic drugs by allowing generic manufacturers to challenge the patents of name-brand drugs. What emerged in the aftermath was a practice where patent-holding pharmaceutical companies simply paid generic manufacturers not to challenge their patents, thus delaying the release of generic drugs for years.

Add new comment

Blog Post | Consumer Protection

Free Cookies - Strings Attached | Jon Fox

The price consumers pay to access most online content is the tracking of their every click on the World Wide Web by data miners and ad networks. Consumer and privacy advocates are seeking to address such online tracking through Do-Not-Track regulation.

Add new comment

Pages

Why do GMOs matter?

GMOs aren't without risk, but it's usually impossible for consumers to tell if they're in our food. So why are we being kept in the dark?

Get the facts
Safer Chemicals, Safer California

This accident in Richmond was a stark reminder of the threat of toxic accidents. Tell the EPA: protect our communities from toxic threats.

Learn more

ADD YOUR VOICE
Making Health Care Work

We're making sure Californians have access to high-quality, affordable health care.

Learn More
STOP TAX DODGERS

Corporate tax avoidance cost taxpayers $100 billion last year. We're working to close the loopholes that allow companies to avoid paying the taxes they owe.

Learn more

Take Action

Act Now
Donate
Join Us

Priority Action

Tell the CEO of Safeway: Stand with consumers and give us the right to know what's in our food. Label your store-brand products that contain GMOs.

Support Us

Your donation supports CALPIRG’s work to stand up for consumers on the issues that matter, especially when powerful interests are blocking progress.

Consumer Alerts

Join our network and stay up to date on our campaigns, get important consumer updates and take action on critical issues.