White House Conference on Aging Forum and New Financial Coaching Initiative

President Barack Obama announces the nomination of Richard Cordray as the first director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on July 18, 2011 with Elizabeth Warren, then interim director of the CFPB.

White House Conference on Aging Regional Forum 

Cleveland, Ohio; April 2015

Prepared Remarks of Richard Cordray 
Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau 

It is an honor to be here today alongside my colleagues who are stalwart champions of our seniors.  We are here because we care about making sure that all Americans, throughout their lifespans, can have the opportunity to learn and develop skills, engage in productive work, make sound choices about their daily lives, and participate fully in the life of our communities. 

We are experiencing the greying of America, with 45 million people in this country who are age 65 or older and 10,000 more who are turning 65 each day.  They are our grandparents, our parents, our neighbors, our friends.  And they are living longer, healthier lives than ever before.  The average American is now spending about twenty years in retirement.  During these years, they are active consumers.  They are still taking out and making payments on mortgages; they are still borrowing to buy cars and trucks; they are still accumulating credit card debt; some are even taking out student loans on behalf of their grandchildren.  These heavier debt loads, that previous generations did not have, can threaten their economic security.

We have recently come through the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.  Many Americans were shaken in their deeply held belief that if they work hard and act responsibly, they can get ahead and retire securely.  Millions lost their jobs, millions lost their homes, and almost all of us lost a substantial chunk of our life savings. 

In the aftermath of the crisis, this country had to make a new beginning.  The new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is part of that fresh start.  We are very busy addressing key problems in the consumer financial markets, and we are working to create a sustainable marketplace where informed consumers can find value in responsible business practices.  Let me briefly describe three ways we are seeking to accomplish these goals.

First, we are cleaning up problems in the financial marketplace through evenhanded oversight and enforcement of the law.  So far our enforcement actions have made over $5.3 billion available to millions of consumers, and we have levied hundreds of millions of dollars in penalties.  We also are improving the financial markets through balanced regulation.  For example, in the largest single consumer financial market in the world — the US mortgage market, worth trillions of dollars — we have adopted sweeping new rules to ensure that the excesses and irresponsible practices that brought about the financial crisis cannot be repeated.  That change alone will help safeguard Americans against the kinds of economic dangers and calamities they suffered just a few short years ago. 

Second, we are addressing individual problems that arise every day through our consumer response function.  To date, we have addressed complaints from over 600,000 consumers.  More than 50,000 of them came from consumers who told us they are age 62 or older.  Through our complaint process, we have helped return millions of dollars to consumers and we have solved other problems that had been frustrating them for months or even years.  Anyone who believes they were mistreated on their mortgage, auto loan, student loan, credit card, or bank account can go to our website at consumerfinance.gov to file a complaint.  It is a simple and easy process and typically takes less than fifteen minutes from start to finish.