a deposit of money that can be withdrawn without prior notice.You know, like your checking account.
Among the results, I found a link to What is the difference between a checking account, a demand deposit account, and a NOW (negotiable order of withdrawal) account? Sounded interesting ((to me)) so I clicked.
It is a page from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. First time I ever ended up there. Wikipedia says
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), also known as the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection (BCFP), is an agency of the United States government responsible for consumer protection in the financial sector...Looking around the site, down at the bottom of the page I noticed a "plain writing" link. Plain writing? This I had to see! But I went first to Orange Crate Art to see if Michael Leddy has anything on the Plain Writing Act. Nope. But Google turned up a link to Beware of the saurus¹, and that sounded interesting. Michael's advice was
The CFPB's creation was authorized by the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, whose passage in 2010 was a legislative response to the financial crisis of 2007–08 and the subsequent Great Recession.
What student-writers need to realize is that it's not ornate vocabulary or word-substitution that makes good writing. Clarity, concision, and organization are far more important in engaging and persuading a reader to find merit in what you're saying.Sounds good to me.
At the CFPB's Plain Writing page I find
The next sentence repeats that thought:Plain writing
The CFPB has adopted plain language as a core principle for all consumer-facing content.
That means we apply plain language principles in all of our consumer materials.Then they go into depth:
We follow plain language guidelines...On the left they present a couple links, including Plain Writing Act. This, too, I had to see.
Trying to see what they think "clear communication" is, I clicked the link to see the Act. Here are some excerpts:Plain Writing Act
The Plain Writing Act of 2010 promotes “clear Government communication that the public can understand and use.”
On October 13, 2010, President Obama signed the Plain Writing Act into law...
An Act to enhance citizen access to Government information and services by establishing that Government documents issued to the public must be written clearly, and for other purposes.There ya go. Clear, concise, and well-organized.
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Plain Writing Act of 2010’’.
The term ‘‘plain writing’’ means writing that is clear, concise, well-organized, and follows other best practices appropriate to the subject or field and intended audience.
Looking for something a little more explicit, I got to OMB Final Guidance on Implementing the Plain Writing Act of 2010 (M 11-15). It says
The Plain Writing Act of 2010 (the Act) (Public Law 111-274), which the President signed into law on October 13, 2010, calls for writing that is clear, concise, and well-organized.And it provides a link to View Guidance on Implementing the Plain Writing Act. That brings up a six-page PDF where we find this:
As defined in the Act, plain writing is writing that is clear, concise, well-organized, and consistent with other best practices appropriate to the subject or field and intended audience. Such writing avoids jargon, redundancy, ambiguity, and obscurity.But most of the PDF was about "Implementing the Plain Writing Act of 2010", which I didn't need.
The PDF does also say
When drafting covered documents, your agency should follow the Federal Plain Language Guidelines available at http://www.plainlanguage.gov/howto/guidelines/bigdoc/TOC.cfm.I clicked that link and it redirected me to Federal plain language guidelines:
These are the official guidelines for the Plain Writing Act of 2010. We developed these guidelines to help you and your agency write clearly...Now we're getting there. But it's a short page: only four paragraphs. Where are the guidelines? Oh! You can download a PDF. So I did.
118 pages.
