Carmen Balber

Consumer Watchdog executive director Carmen Balber has been with the organization for nearly two decades. She spent four years directing the group’s Washington, D.C. office where she advocated for key health insurance market reforms that were ultimately enacted into law as part of the Affordable Care Act.

Balber is recognized as a leading expert on a wide range of personal insurance issues and has authored or co-authored numerous reports on the auto, health and medical malpractice insurance industries, and insurance rate regulation. She leads Consumer Watchdog’s advocacy to improve patient safety in California, including passage of first-in-the-nation legislation requiring doctors to disclose when they are on probation for sexual misconduct to patients, and legislation requiring doctors to check a patient’s prescription history before prescribing opioids and other drugs. In 2012, she managed the coalition effort to defeat Prop 33, a $17 million insurance industry initiative that would have raised rates on good drivers. Her commentaries have appeared in publications across the country, from the Boston Globe, to the Houston Chronicle, to the Los Angeles Times.

As an organizer with Consumer Watchdog, Balber ran campaigns to pass volunteer-qualified ballot measures enacting the nation’s strongest municipal conflict of interest protections in five cities across California. She also coordinated citizen organizing efforts in Consumer Watchdog’s successful volunteer lobbying effort to block a legislative utility bailout in Sacramento in 2001.

Before joining Consumer Watchdog, Balber learned the ropes at the Colorado and Washington PIRGs. She holds a B.A. in Politics from Pomona College in Claremont, California and is a graduate of the Armand Hammer United World College of the American West (now UWC-USA) in Montezuma, New Mexico, one of 17 secondary schools across the globe dedicated to making education a force for peace, sustainability and change by bringing together youth from a diversity of countries and cultures to live and learn.

Carmen Balber

KBCW 44 Cable 12 – San Francisco, CA: Chevy Camaro Thefts On The Rise

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmuyO5DfVM8 Carmen Balber says we have seen this problem with other cars impact consumers ability to get auto insurance. Insurance companies cannot just increase prices...

KXTV-SAC (ABC) – Sacramento, CA: Proposed Insurance Changes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKIfzHcWuv8&feature=youtu.be Carmen Balber with Consumer Watchdog worries the state's process of approving these models won't be transparent enough.

As Drafted, Insurance Commissioner’s Proposed Rules for Insurance Catastrophe Models Preserve Secrecy of Black Box Models

Los Angeles, CA - Consumer Watchdog issued the following statement about the proposed catastrophe modeling rules released by Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara today. “Black box...

ABC7 – What’s California doing to address the insurance crisis?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssxyylYXWtw "One of the other things that we're urging the state to do is create a public model to look at climate risk in California...

Consumer Alert — Insurance Attack

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISeOVaBCURE&feature=youtu.be The insurance industry is trying to do away with a law that has saved Californians billions of dollars on our car and home insurance...

How Citizen Enforcement of Proposition 103 has Saved Californians $5.5 Billion – and Why the Insurance Industry Hates It

When California’s insurance regulator operated behind closed doors, the insurance companies always won. Insurance premiums soared, people were denied insurance for no legitimate reason,...

Study: Public Scrutiny Has Saved Californians Over $5.5 Billion on Home, Auto Insurance Since 2002, Including $885 Million at Year-End

Seeking Billions in Premium Increases, Insurance Industry Targets Law that Gives Consumers a Say in Insurance Pricing Los Angeles, CA – Consumer Watchdog, a non-profit citizen...

Spectrum News 1 (San Fernando Valley) – Los Angeles, CA: Insurance Revenue: What You Need To Know

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbPte_GinXs&feature=youtu.be Carmen Balber with Consumer Watchdog says rate increases combined with environmental circumstances, creates the perfect storm for southern Californians.

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