Representatives from the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) testified yesterday before the subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee alongside representatives of various small businesses and manufacturers regarding the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) of 2008. Both congressmen and business owners argue that the regulation is burdensome and stifles job creation. Testimony revealed that toy makers especially (among other manufacturers of childrens’ products) have failed because they could not pay for expensive third-party lead testing mandated by the CPSIA.
While one CPSC commissioner, Anne Northup, asserted that the CPSIA testing requirements “stifle innovation and product variety by erecting significant cost barriers to adding to toys new accessories, new colors, or other variations,” Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) contends that the law is “necessary to protect kids and families across the country.”
“Protect them from what exactly?” asks ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross. “The devastating effect on small business wreaked by this law has in no way been justified by any benefit to public health. Prior to passing the CPSIA, documented injuries in children due to lead poisoning from consumer products was nearly non-existent. The lead contamination which provoked this travesty came from China, not our own industry. The act was bad enough before, and now the CPSC will be imposing even more onerous and unnecessary regulations.”
