This may be as good as it gets: NZ and Australia face a complicated puzzle when it comes to supermarket prices
How Trump Is Helping Price Gougers Exploit His Tariffs
Emboldened by the new administration’s regulatory reprieve, “price optimization” consultants are showing corporations how to weaponize import levies to fleece consumers.
https://www.levernews.com/how-trump-is-helping-price-gougers-exploit-his-tariffs/
"The day after President Donald Trump announced his sweeping “Liberation Day” tariffs, pricing guru Craig Zawada held an urgent summit for his clients. The global economy was roiling with anxiety, and stocks were in a tailspin, but Zawada had a more hopeful message to impart: For the businesses deploying his company’s “smart pricing” software, this was a rare opportunity.
“There is perhaps more of a window to make changes to your pricing than there has been before,” Zawada said. Consumers, he explained, were bracing themselves for tariff sticker shock: “Customers expect change.”
“Now,” he said, “is the time to take advantage.”
Zawada works for PROS Holdings, a company that provides software services helping companies price their products, tailored in particular to airlines. He’s part of a cottage industry of “pricing optimization” consultants who, using lessons learned from pandemic price increases, are advising companies across industries on how to hike prices in response to tariffs or even just the threat of tariffs — and then keep them high.
Republican Federal Trade Commission (FTC) chair Andrew Ferguson, the nation’s top antitrust cop, has been warning companies that enforcers are prepared to take action against tariff profiteering. Yet he has effectively given the consultant class a “green light,” as one former FTC official told The Lever, by rolling back an inquiry scrutinizing their practices."
https://www.levernews.com/how-trump-is-helping-price-gougers-exploit-his-tariffs/
Here's the farm that supplies the eggs we have been buying from PCC Markets (not sure what the letters PCC stand for any more, perhaps Puget Community Coop?) and they haven't been above $8.50 since Avian Influenza Virus H5N1 has been decimating egg laying flocks. The chickens eat organic food and are not subjected to antibiotics and hormones. We're on our own with renegade White House DOA, but we trust these farmers. Other farms are available.
#eggprices #pricegouging
**Could Trump’s tariffs give a green light for corporate profiteering?**
_“My suspicion is, in an environment where there is a broad expectation of higher inflation in the US, where consumers are generally expecting it, companies will feel more able to go for the price increase option.”_
#Analysis #Trump #Tariffs #Inflation #Economics #Corporations #PriceGouging #Greedflation @economics
Still no public response as to why @Tesco @Sainsburys @Asda @Morrisons @LidlGB @AldiUK charge more for standard cola compared to diet cola, given they both contain sweetners so don't qualify for the sugar tax.
Capitalism: consequences of greed. Adobe Deletes Bluesky Posts After Furious Backlash
https://petapixel.com/2025/04/10/adobe-deletes-bluesky-posts-after-furious-backlash/
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43653885
Guardian: Cal-Maine’s profits more than tripled compared with the same quarter last year – and are nearly eight times as high as at the start of the bird flu outbreak in February 2022, according to financial results published on Tuesday. The company, which produces 20% of the eggs eaten in the US, made $1bn in windfall income in the first three-quarters of the financial year – the profits extracted after accounting for production, processing and transport costs.
On Tuesday, Cal-Maine said that its sales almost doubled to $1.42bn in the fiscal third quarter, which ended on 1 March, primarily down to raising egg prices, which has hurt consumers who rely on the once affordable protein source. But the company’s shares then fell by more than 4% after acknowledging that it was being investigated by the justice department’s anti-trust division. Mississippi-based Cal-Maine said it received notice of the investigation into egg price increases last month and that it was cooperating with the investigation.
Congressman just ripped into Trump trade rep in House hearing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgL5QgIk8d0
Trump's Trade Rep appeared to learn about the 90-day tariff pause in the middle of a House hearing. Rep. Steven Horsford grilled him immediately:
"Is this market manipulation? Who benefits? What billionaire benefits from this?“
By VOTING for DEMOCRATS We Make OUR LIVES BETTER!
Democratic lawmakers across four states have introduced bills this year to stop what’s been dubbed “surveillance pricing” — the term for when a business charges customers different prices for the same product depending on their personal information. #economy #Democrats #pricegouging
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/02/20/surveillance-prices-wages-california-ban/
@GossiTheDog pretty shure #Apple's #Greedflation will not result in their #iPhone|s and other products to be sold #cheaper in the #EU, but instead they'll do #PriceGouging even harder!
Or does anyone expect Apple to stop #overcharging for their #AntiRepairDesign|ed products???
Grocery Shoppers Will Feel the Tariffs First in Produce https://www.byteseu.com/894607/ #America #coffee #Customs(Tariff) #FeesAndRates) #Food #PriceGouging #Prices(Fares #seafood #SupermarketsAndGroceryStores #UnitedStates #UnitedStatesOfAmerica #US #USNews #USA #USANews
I went to Lucky's to check out their pricing. There's this odd phenomenon where they sometimes come close to matching Safeway's pricing.
Collusion?
A 20 fl oz Mountain Dew is $3.29 there, but if you buy 2, you get them for $2.25 each, which is probably close to the REAL pricing for the product.
At least their 2 litter is more expensive at $3.99 (which seems high!), but is $2.50 if you buy 2.
What's with the multiple/combo buys?!
It amazes me 7-Eleven is STILL cheaper if you simply buy a single bottle.
By the way, the Lucky's checker reminded me that you need to use the mobile app to achieve additional savings. Shades of Safeway.
Basically you have to jump through hoops for savings.
I'm going to need to perform a Target run to see what they're charging. I'm beginning to wonder if I need to shop there more often.
I'm also wondering if prices are creeping up in groceries in general.
I noticed something when I was at the store yesterday to pick up one item. I thought about picking up a 20 fl oz Mountain Dew as well, which Safeway is selling for $3.49. What?!
If you buy a 2 liter bottle, a larger size of Mountain Drew at Safeway, it's $3.29, or .20 cheaper. How is that possible?
If you buy a 20 fl oz Mountain Dew at 7-Eleven, typically the most expensive way to buy anything, it's $2.69
Safeway is price gouging.
You could shop at 7-Eleven and save money 
I've said this before, don't buy beverages of any kind at Safeway.
Via LA County CJIC: It is illegal to raise prices by more than 10% during an emergency. This law extends to rental property and essential goods and services.
To file a complaint visit dcba.lacounty.gov or call (800) 593-8222.
ACCC finds Australia’s supermarkets are among the world’s most profitable – but doesn’t accuse them of price gouging
State Farm can hike rates on #California homeowners — if it pauses cancellations and proves need https://calmatters.org/economy/2025/03/state-farm-can-hike-insurance-premiums-with-conditions/?utm_campaign=20250320_250319+Wildfire+Updates&utm_medium=email&utm_source=sfmc_&utm_content=&utm_term=245853060 #PriceGouging
Landlords Want Us to Think Rent Gouging Isn’t #PriceGouging https://jacobin.com/2025/03/rent-control-price-gouging-landlords/
Fuck off T-Mobile!
No doubt they are happy to increase their prices now that the administration is dismantling the consumer-protection agency.
This isn't normal.
Cards get sold for € 1.100 when their MSRP is€ 600
