Unsafe Toys: Report Says Conservative Trade, Regulatory Policies at Fault

by James Parks, Oct 30, 2007

When children go trick-or-treating for Halloween tonight, parents want to make sure they are safe. But how can we be sure? Just last week, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) recalled imported Halloween pails children might use for their treats because they contained high amounts of lead.

In the past two months alone, more than 13 million toys have been recalled after tests indicated lead levels that sometimes reached nearly 200 times the federal safety limit.

How did it get this bad? Today, the Institute for America’s Future released a eye-opening report, Toxic Trade: Globalization and the Safety of the American Consumer, pinpointing the problem. The report shows how the double mantra of free trade at all costs and little or no regulation at home have combined to make the products we buy toxic and unsafe.

Even as corporations are sending U.S. manufacturing jobs to countries with terrible safety records, the Bush administration is deliberately undermining the CPSC, which is charged with protecting us from dangerous products.

Millions of U.S. manufacturing jobs have been lost to globalization, especially to China, where a lack of workers’ rights and safety and environmental standards is well documented. According to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), the growing U.S. trade deficit with China has cost 2.1 million U.S. jobs between 1997 and 2006.

With more and more of the products sold in our stores being imported from countries that have lax safety and environmental standards, the report’s authors say:

When it comes to imported products, Americans are basically on their own. 

But we can act now to help make products, especially toys safer. Reps. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) and Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) have introduced the Safety Assurance for Every (SAFE) Consumer Product Act, which would require children’s products to undergo independent testing and strengthen the CPSC’s enforcement authority. The bill has quickly attracted more than 100 co-sponsors. Click here to urge your lawmaker to become a co-sponsor.

At the same time as we import unsafe products, the agency that is charged with protecting us from toxic toys and clothes is being starved of money and resources. The CPSC has half the staff it had in the 1980s. It has only one full-time employee to test toys. Only 15 inspectors are assigned to police all imports of consumer products under the agency’s supervision, a marketplace that last year was valued at $614 billion.

Yet, amazingly, The New York Times reports today that Nancy Nord, acting chairwoman of the CPSC, has asked Congress not to give the agency more money, more staff or more authority to protect American consumers from bad and unhealthy products.

If you check out BushWatchon the AFL-CIO website, you’ll see that Nord, a former official of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, sent two letters to Capitol Hill asking lawmakers to reject measures that would strengthen the agency. Her reasoning? She opposes provision in the bills that would increase penalties against companies for safety violations, make it easier for the government to let the public know about faulty products, protect industry whistleblowers and prosecute executives of companies that knowingly violate the law.

Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), who chairs the consumer safety subcommittee, told The New York Times:

It’s hard for me to know if it’s just ideological or she is just expressing the wishes of the administration. Either way, it comes to the same conclusion, and that is that they say they want more resources, but they are very reluctant to accept those resources.

Unions are taking action to address these critical failures and gaps. Last month, the United Steelworkers (USW) launched a major campaign, “ Protect Our Kids—Stop Toxic Imports,” in which the union will distribute thousands of Get the Lead Out Screening kits and spearhead a series of “Safe Home Sessions,” so families can learn more about protecting themselves and their loved ones.

At the same time, these programs help working families fight the failed trade policies and inadequate regulatory protections that allow dangerous products to threaten families and jobs.

But the bottom line is that conservative policies have failed the American people and made the products we use less safe. As Robert Borosage, co-director of the Institute for America’s Future, says:

We should never have to worry about our children’s enjoyment of Halloween or the winter holidays. But that’s what the failure of conservatism has done to us. It’s time to close the book on conservatism and clean up the mess they’ve left.

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