NEW YORK – Today, Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani and New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection (DCWP) Commissioner Samuel A.A. Levineannounced sweeping new consumer protections that will crack down on junk fees and subscription traps, making it easier for New Yorkers to know the real price of what they are buying and to stop paying for the services they no longer want.
Following Mayor Mamdani’s Executive Orders 9 and 10, the City announced a proposed rule requiring transparent, all-in pricing that bans hidden junk fees, alongside a final “Click to Cancel” rule that guarantees consumers can cancel subscriptions as easily as they sign up for them.
Together, these rules represent one of the strongest municipal consumer protection efforts in the country and build upon Mayor Mamdani’s affordability agenda, including the City’s rule banning hidden hotel fees. The Click-to-Cancel Rule alone is estimated to save New Yorkers up to $162.5 million per year.
“For years, companies have built their business model around making it harder for working people to hold onto their money,” said Mayor Mamdani. “Whether it’s hidden fees that suddenly appear at checkout or subscriptions that take one click to sign up for and a dozen steps to cancel, the result is the same: working people pay more while corporations profit. That ends now. If you can sign up with one click, you can cancel with one click.”
I’ve written so many posts over the years saying that consumer protection is good policy that’s also good politics (to riff on one of Joe’s favorite sayings), and this is a great example. It’s not hard if you’re not beholden to corporate donors. It’s not “radical” unless you’re a corporation that’s going to lose the money you were screwing out of your victim/customers. It’s also something that people who don’t pay attention to politics, or are cynical about politics, will notice.
In other words, it’s the kind of thing that should be part of the future of the Democratic Party.
