Tabla de contenidos para August 2016 en Consumer Reports

TACKLING STUDENT DEBT AT CONSUMER REPORTS, we envision a day when every American can get an affordable college education and contribute to society unburdened by the pressure of excessive debt. As part of our mission to help build a fairer, safer, and healthier marketplace, we’ll be tackling the problem of student debt—starting with this month’s cover package, which begins on page 28—and working with you to find solutions. Right now, borrowing money for higher education is increasingly difficult for people to avoid because of rising college costs and declining household incomes. About 42 million Americans owe $1.3 trillion in education debt. Interest is often fixed at high rates, and student debt, unlike other loans, can be difficult to refinance. And federal loans that are refinanced lose important consumer protections, such…

Source: EnergySage A LOOK AT WHAT YOU LOSE BY LEASING A comparison of how much a residential solar system could save a New Jersey homeowner, depending on whether it was bought up front, bought with a loan, or leased BEST WAYS TO PAY FOR YOUR PANELS Cash Buying your solar electric system outright is best. It usually costs $15,000 to $20,000 after tax credits and can reduce your electricity bill by 70 to 100 percent, depending on the size and orientation of your roof and local regulations. Most systems pay for themselves in five to seven years. Home Equity Loan If you need to finance your solar panel purchase, the most cost-effective way to do it is to use a home equity loan or a home equity line of credit.…

WHEN TICKETS for Adele’s 2016 North American tour went on sale on the morning of Dec. 17, most of the tens of millions of fans who logged onto the Ticket master website to snag a seat probably suspected they were facing long odds. What they may not have known was why. They weren’t just competing with one another: They were also facing a more formidable foe in the form of ticket brokers and unscrupulous speculators who would grab up most of the 300,000 or so available seats that Billboard reported sold out in less than an hour. After that, fans could purchase tickets only from brokers and other scalpers (those who resell tickets for a profit) on the resale market— at astronomical markups. At the Palace of Auburn Hills in…

THE LATEST RATINGS FROM OUR LABS How to Wear It Well A helmet can’t protect you if it’s loose. Find one that fits your head shape as closely as possible, then follow these steps to make sure it stays on snugly. Scan any page in this section using the Blippar app to see our bike helmet buying guide and to watch a video on the correct way to fit a bike helmet (see page 7 for details). IF YOU’RE RIDING your bike in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., with your head unprotected, don’t be surprised if you hear a voice bellowing at you from a passing car: “Get a helmet!” It could be Consumer Product Safety Commission Chairman Elliot Kaye’s 6-year-old son, who has taken it upon himself to be…

New & Improved We previously rated the Cannondale Teramo as a Don’t Buy: Safety Risk because the buckle on the chin strap broke during our testing. Cannondale has changed the buckle, and the helmet now passes our chin-strap test. It also performed well overall and is new to our recommended list. If you own a Cannondale Teramo with the old buckle design, we recommend that you not use it. If you are buying a new Cannondale Teramo, be sure that it has the new buckle design. Go to ConsumerReports.org/cannondale for more information, including images of the old and new buckles. THERE ARE a growing number of city bike-share programs across the country, but it appears that renters are less likely to wear a helmet than people who ride their own…

Scan any page in this section using the Blippar app to see our kitchen appliance buying guides (see page 7 for details). IF YOU’RE CONTEMPLATING a kitchen remodel, there’s a good chance you’ve been drooling over photos of Carrara marble countertops and commercial-grade ranges on websites like Houzz, Pinterest, and Remodelista. But for all of the inspiration those sites provide, they tend to be short of a couple of crucial details: the price of all that beauty and, just as important, how the pretty products perform. Consumer Reports will tell you that those marble countertops are stain-prone, that many pro-style ranges don’t work as well as models costing much less, and that the cost of both would devour much of the $28,000 that the average American spends on a professionally…

Sharing the Pain The comprehensive package of stories on “Pain Relief Now” in our June issue covered everything from the current state of analgesic options to how to prevent the most common pain problems altogether—and it must have really hit a nerve. Readers shared many experiences, insights, and opinions about pain and its solutions. I FOUND YOUR ARTICLE “Tell Me How Much It Hurts” very interesting. My wife has a chronic pain issue, and we have been to several different “pain management doctors.” She has been asked to rate her pain on a scale of 1 to 10 at each visit. When she said it was a 10, one assistant said that’s not possible because you would have to be dead. At another doctor’s office, the assistant said 10 wasn’t…

In February the leasing giant SolarCity closed its operations in Nevada, laying offmore than 550 employees there. A couple of months earlier, the Nevada Public Utilities Commission, which regulates the state’s energy market, voted to cut by 2 cents per kilowatt-hour the credit that homeowners get for the solar-generated electricity their systems contribute to the grid, with more reductions to follow. “That works out to an average of $11,000 in lost savings for every solar customer over their 25-year lease,” says SolarCity CEO Lyndon Rive. “Worst of all, regulators applied the change retroactively to the 17,000 existing solar customers in the state.” The Nevada decision is the most extreme outcome yet of a battle being waged by utilities against the growing solar industry nationwide. In Arizona, one utility has applied…

“I feel I kind of ruined my life by going to college; I can’t plan for an actual future.” –JACKIE KROWEN, 32, PORTLAND, OREGON $152,000, STUDENT DEBT Almost every American knows an adult burdened by a student loan. Fewer know that growing alongside 42 million indebted students is a formidable private industry that has been enriched by those very loans. A generation ago, the federal government opened its student loan bank to profit-making corporations. Privateequity companies and Wall Street banks seized on the flow of federal loan dollars, peddling loans students sometimes could not afford and then collecting fees from the government to hound students when they defaulted. Step by step, one law after another has been enacted by Congress to make student debt the worst kind of debt for…

1885 The first known patent for a vehicular seat belt is given to Edward J. Claghorn by the U.S. Patent Office. 1903 Gustave-Désiré Leveau of France invents a seat belt system with adjustable diagonal chest and lap belts. 1930s Members of the medical profession urge the automotive industry “to equip automobiles with seat belts as standard.” 1949-50 Nash automobiles are the first to offer factory-installed lap belts. 1951 Roger W. Griswold and Hugh DeHaven obtain a patent for a three-point belt. 1955-56 Ford and Chrysler begin to offer lap belts. 1956 Consumer Reports finds that many cross-lap seat belts fail basic safety and durability tests. 1959 Volvos become the first cars to be fitted with three-point lap/shoulder belts. 1965 Ralph Nader’s “Unsafe at Any Speed,” an indictment of the auto…

HYBRIDS Toyota Prius OVERALL SCORE 76 FIFTY-TWO MPG. That’s a drop-themic moment. That overall fuel economy milestone we recorded in our tests for the redesigned 2016 Prius hybrid is a phenomenal achievement, especially viewed against the previous generation’s already impressive 44 mpg overall. In fact, it gets the most miles per gallon of any vehicle we’ve ever tested. At a glance the Prius’ powertrain appears largely carryover— which makes you wonder how fuel economy could jump so quickly. It turns out that an extensive collection of small engineering changes conspires to make the 1.8-liter, fourcylinder engine exceptionally miserly. Also helping is a more efficient transmission, a highertech lithium battery, and a more aerodynamic lozenge body shape. One mpg here, another mpg there … pretty soon you’re talking a huge improvement.…

LET THE SUNSHINE IN A look at how today’s residential solar systems generate enough power to meet all or most of a household’s electricity needs THE GRID Homes with solar power remain connected to the grid, drawing power from it at night (and during cloudy weather) and feeding any surplus electricity to it during the day. The goal is to create a system that produces as much energy as you use, for net-zero electrical consumption. INVERTER Converts the DC current generated by the solar panels into AC current, which is then fed to the home’s existing electrical service panel so that it can be used to power household appliances. NET METER Unlike a standard electric meter, this can run in reverse. You are charged for the power you draw from…

PLAYING MUSIC from iTunes on Apple devices is a cinch. Sync your iPhone, iPod, and iPad to your computer, and any songs you’ve downloaded will appear on all of those gadgets. You can also subscribe to iTunes Match ($24.99 annually), which lets you download or stream your music from Apple’s iCloud server to up to 10 devices. But for the 65 percent of Americans who use Android phones, accessing iTunes takes a little bit more effort. First, download Google’s Music app to your phone from Google Play (unless it’s already installed), says our electronics editor, Mike Gikas. Next, download Google Play Music Manager to the computer that holds your iTunes music (it can be either a Mac or PC). And last, upload your iTunes library from your computer to Google…

THE BIKE stops suddenly because it hits a solid object, such as a car, or more gradually in a sliding fall. The first milliseconds of the crash are important because some of the energy is dissipated when the frame or wheel crumples, or by the friction of the slide. THE RIDER is still in motion, even though the bike has stopped. The rider might take a dive over the handlebars or simply tumble sideways to the ground. An unprotected human skull can withstand modest impacts—for example, if you fell while running and hit your head on soft ground or a tree. But the force involved in a bicycle accident is much greater. Many factors affect the outcome of a fall. But in general, depending on the rider’s height, in a…

PUBLIC HEALTH EXPERTS are increasingly concerned about the Zika virus. To combat that threat, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends a full array of anti-mosquito measures, especially for people living in or traveling to parts of South America or the Caribbean, including Puerto Rico. Those steps include applying effective insect repellents, with ingredients such as deet or picaridin, to skin and clothing. But another option recommended by the CDC is to wear clothing that has been treated with the insecticide permethrin. Those clothes—including shirts, pants, and hats—are made by several manufacturers, notably Burlington and Insect Shield, and are sold by brands such as ExOfficio and L.L.Bean. Sales have surged in recent months as health officials struggle to protect vulnerable populations from Zika-carrying mosquitoes. It’s especially worrisome for…

With so many options, figuring out where to go to college can be overwhelming. Large research university or small liberal arts college? City school or rural school? Close to home or out of state? Guidance counselors talk of finding a school that’s the right “fit” academically and that has an atmosphere that suits the student. But as students and parents get wrapped up in the emotional quest for a “dream school,” they can lose sight of the financial consequences of the decisions they make. And when the acceptance letters finally (hopefully) roll in, families of college-bound students can find themselves scrambling to figure out exactly how they’re going to pay for it all. Today a four-year education at a state school—including tuition, fees, and room and board—costs an average of…

SEAT BELT USE SAVED 12,500 LIVES AND PREVENTED 308,000 SERIOUS INJURIES IN 2010. THOSE AVERTED TRAGEDIES ALSO SAVED $50 billion IN MEDICAL CARE AND LOST PRODUCTIVITY. MORE THAN A HALF CENTURY of safety advances, public-relations campaigns, legislation, and advertising pitches by the Department of Transportation (DOT) and the world’s automakers have persuaded 88.5 percent of Americans to fasten their seat belts when they get into their cars. But that also means 11.5 percent of vehicle drivers and passengers still don’t buckle up. That translates to almost 25 million people who ignore the public-service ads, the reminder chimes in their vehicles, the 49 state laws that make seat belt use mandatory, and the nagging from loved ones who do click into their seat belts. At this point in the history of…