Supreme Court Rules In Favor of Corporations Over Consumers (Again)

In another victory for corporations against consumers, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that indivuduals cannot band together and bring their claims as a class action and must each individually bear the expense of arbitration against the corporate defendant. In most class actions, individual cases themselves are not financially valuable enough to warrant the time and expense of litigation, but when many cases are combined, the cost-benefit analysis favors consumers as a whole. By forcing each claimant to go it alone, corporations stand to reap huge windfalls since many (probably most) individuals won’t invest the time and money required to be made whole.

In AT&T Mobility vs. Conception, five Republican appointed justices banded together in providing another example of why ordinary citizens should pay attention to judicial appointments and the people elected who make those appointments.