The CPSC's new lead and phthalates restrictions and testing requirements for childrens' products kicked in earlier this year, and though some details are still to be decided, the contours of the new American toyscape are becoming clearer: giant toy companies manufacturing overseas and testing and certifying in their own labs are going to do fine. international toymakers and independent and handcrafted types are screwed, as are the secondhand and thrift shop industries....Meanwhile, DT reader Caitlin reports that the owner of their local mom&pop toy store told them BRIO, the venerable Swedish wooden toy maker, is pulling out of the US altogether rather than incur the expense of third-party CPSIA testing. Brio is best known for their high-end wooden trains, which have been pummeled by the multi-channel, cross-promotional branded juggernaut of Thomas the Tank Engine. Which of course, were the toy that kcked off the big Summer of Lead Toys Scare in 2007.
He also links to a New York Times story on the CPSIA, and it's better than previous NYT efforts on this story (when they weren't just whistling and looking the other way while the consumer groups mugged cottage industries). The reporter did a little more homework instead of just relying unquestionably on the press release handouts Consumer Groups (really, these are litigation groups interested in self aggrandizement and enriching their own coffers under the guise of 'serving' the consumers they shaft).
It's interesting that once upon a time the consumer groups insisted testing would only cost 25.00, then they doubled it to fifty, and now they don't want to talk about cost of implementation anymore. They lobbied to get this bill passed on the basis of their very false claims that testing would be reasonable and affordable for small businesses, and it turns out they were wrong by a factor of around 100, and I'd like to see them answer for this.
And this is kind of amusing in a 'my house is on fire, but let's laugh anyway' sort of way- remember how those 'consumer' groups who supposedly represent the little guy kept insisting there were no little guys really being hurt by this bill, that everybody who said so was just lying and a sock puppet or a sort of astroturfed faker from the evil Big Companies?
That backlash seems to have left a mark, because now the small cottage industries are no longer phony, dishonest 'fronts' for Big Business. They are stupid, ignorant, rubes, dupes of big industry:
“This is landmark legislation,” said Nancy A. Cowles, executive director of Kids in Danger, a nonprofit that focused on safety in children’s products that supported the measure.
“These groups are not above using the small crafters to reopen the legislation and get the changes they want.”
Right. Because small crafters are certainly too clueless to know their own business and own interests better than Nancy Cowles and her ilk.
The legislation NEEDS to be reopened and those changes need to be made, because this is failed legislation, Cowles. How on earth these people can keep defending a bill that treats books and ball point pens as toxic killers and still face themselves in a mirror is beyond me.
The WSJ has an excellent article where they note that, as we CPSIA Don Quixote types have been saying the CPSIA stupidly actually regulates any risk assessment out of the picture- making common sense a violation of the law:
It's a brass-plated trainwreck. Pin ItLead is a typical component of brass but poses minuscule risk to children through toys. As the CPSC's own staff remarked, "the estimated exposure to lead from children's contact with the die-cast toys would have little impact on the blood lead level." But no matter, the language of the law says the Commission can't consider risk in granting exclusions. Any potential absorption of lead at all is grounds for a ban, despite its presence in other common brass fixtures kids get their hands on regularly, like doorknobs and keys.
Democrats in Congress have insisted that problems with the law they wrote are the fault of the CPSC charged with implementing it. How's that going? Following the Commission's 3-2 vote against the brass exemption, CPSC Commissioner Anne Northrop noted that the decision not to grant a brass exemption shows that "the Commission does not believe there is any [flexibility] written into the law." Without action from Congress to address the chaos it created, Ms. Northrop said, "More small businesses will be forced to shut down."
