Sunday, January 4, 2009

Seriously Congress?

Since I live in a bubble, the first I heard of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act was here on Christie's blog. Um, what??

Admittedly, I have really only skimmed some articles (including this one from the LA Times) about this new law, but from what I understand it would prohibit the resale of children's clothes and toys as well as the sale of handmade childrens items - unless they are tested for lead and such. It appears that there may be some flexibility in how the law will be interpreted, but it still seems pretty harsh. I get that we need to protect our children from the hazardous crap that can be found in unregulated products, but this is just ridiculous.

We have quite a few baby items that are second hand. When you have a child, you figure out pretty quickly that everything does not have to be new. The Jaeby (new term courtesy of Kelly) changes clothing sizes more frequently than I shower these days. Maybe Congress could also consider imposing restrictions on familial hand-me-downs? Between that and my proposed pay cut from the Governator, we may have to live on soup for the next 18+ years.

1 comment:

crbeyer said...

I was just informed of this and am horrified. So many people count on being able to buy used including me. I contacted everyone I know and told them about it as well as contacted my state rep and senators please do the same, if enough of us contact our state reps and senators and congress people we can maybe make a difference.