Report and Event Highlight Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's Impact

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has released their annual report on the work the agency is doing to "improve the financial literacy of consumers and initiatives to educate and empower consumers to make better informed financial decisions." As recently-confirmed CFPB director Richard Cordray explains in his introduction to the report, this is important work: "Empowering people to take more control over their economic lives is absolutely essential to [the CFPB's] mission. But consumers should not have to go it alone, without ready access to a trusted source of impartial and expert information about matters of consumer finance." The report goes on to detail the agency's financial education work, focusing on their efforts to support research on what strategies work well to promote the financial knowledge and skills of average Americans, as well as on their outreach efforts to particularly vulnerable groups.

Earlier this week, a group of asset-building practitioners and policymakers, consumer advocates, and long-time supporters of the CFPB gathered for a policy forum looking at the impact the agency has had thus far. Organized by CFED and Democracy Journal, the forum featured Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, who is widely acknowledged to have laid the visionairy groundwork for a federal agency capable of regulating the financial services marketplace. In her remarks (watch a recording here), Senator Warren noted how rising expenses and stagnant incomes have squeezed America's middle class - while the consumer credit market was able to thrive. The timing of the event - just one day after the U.S. Senate confirmed the CFPB's director - was perfect. Getting to this point has been, as Warren put it, "a tough fight." To audience chuckles, she undertoned, "Boy, that was the understatement of my life..."

Senator Warren and the panelists that followed her were able to point to some impressive accomplishments from the CFPB. Warren pointed to the millions of dollars in refunds the CFPB has helped consumers win back from credit card companies who engaged in deceptive practices. Jeremie Greer of CFED explained how the CFPB was able to help choke off the proliferation of subprime mortgage products - while still allowing enough flexibility in the market to allow community development financial institutions to continue serving their lower-income clients. Bill Bynum from a Mississippi-based Hope Credit Union celebrated the CFPB's impacts on underserved communities, but also highlighted additional areas to focus, such as with payday lending regulation. Finally, Mae Watson Grote of New York's Financial Clinic described CFPB's role in supporting the financial coaching model that her organization has found to be so effective at getting money back into the hands of clients.

With just two years of work under its belt, the CFPB has made some impressive ripples in the consumer financial marketplace. Ongoing input from community-level organizations, policy and research groups, and members of the public will continue to shape the issues CFPB takes on and the direction of its work.

Check out the report on its financial education work here and let us know your thoughts by leaving a comment below: what do you think the CFPB's most important contribution to date has been?