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This stuff about the price reductions after 4 years of blatant gouging is really freaking me out

I mean, that’s 4 years of our lives taken! 4 years of opportunities that were more challenging because they wanted a number on a computer to go up! 4 years of feeling worse than necessary about my finances and management of them and general personhood because i felt like i couldn’t afford anything because everything was priced egregiously!

And now they’re saying ‘oh well we fixed it now’. Fuck you!!! Get over yourselves! Holy shit, I can’t wait to happily be friends with the giant corporations again!! Just the arrogance that we’re happy to once again be at their beck and call because they changed the numbers they could’ve always changed. Sickening.

And I feel like I have a brain disease because i’ve been worrying and posting for years about how disgusting it is that they’re just cranking the numbers up to see what’ll happen and obviously no one will stop them because this is an oligarchy — and i kept getting well-ackshullyied into the ground by esteemed logical posters explaining how supply chains work. Well look at this shit you motherfuckers!

Just the amount of incredibly deep and sophisticated social engineering is so disgusting:

It’s a savvy play for shifting perceptions of value, crucial for consumers in the decision-making process of where to shop for bread and eggs. Customers benefit by saving some money; retailers possibly benefit even more by being known as the company that magnanimously trimmed prices.

Go to hell, stop shifting my value perception. I should be able to decide what I feel about milk or zucchini. When I think about a croissant I should be thinking about France, not Target pricing strategies.

Most importantly, the theater of making grand pronouncements about lower prices is great for retailers’ reputations. Forget about all the price hikes grocery retailers and food brands implemented in the last few years — now companies would like consumers to focus on the savings they’re offering. “They’re all leaning into this inflation-oriented messaging,” says Stambor, which he notes is interesting because food inflation isn’t high at the moment. It’s the accumulation of past inflation that we’re still feeling the sting of; the prices just didn’t come down.

And we’re meant to thank them for this! I hope to god they can’t put the genie back in the bottle with this. I won’t forget 2020, I’ll hate these bloodsuckers til the day I die.

collapse_already ,

The new lower prices are all performative headline makers to get the proles to stop sharpening their knives. Lower a few (definitely not all) items for press purposes / loss leaders.

Cosmicomical ,

We have observed an incredible acceleration in accumulation of money in the hands of the ultra-rich. This alone tells us that supply chain is not the issue. The issues are greed of the bloodsucking class and complicity from the governments around the world that should monitor and regulate the prices of basic necessities but don’t.

secretlyaddictedtolinux ,

The problem is that we have 2 groups of people who experience this problem: the easily deluded religious people, who will fall for moral wedge issues based on religion, and the people who realize things should be different and will vote in their interests.

The second problem is many of the people who want to change things will try to implement strategies that don’t adhere to classical economics and will create market distortions, so if more “liberal” people are voted in, they may do more harm than good for poor people if they ignore economic principles.

The third problem is that there are way more stupid religious idiots that are easily manipulated than people who vote their interests.

It’s infuriating

AdolfSchmitler ,

Thank you for posting this. I feel the same way but I’m not sure what to do about it :/ I already try to spend as little as possible. I’ve thought about trying to make a vegetable garden cuz in a way it’s free food but just haven’t :/

I wonder what will happen when they squeeze so hard nobody has anything left? How will they stay in business when nobody has money? Do they think every other company will go out of business but they’ll be fine? What do they think the end game will be?

secretlyaddictedtolinux ,

I remember all the large chains I used to like who I feel have fucked me over and hold a grudge against them.

Arizona Ice Tea is an example of a brand that really has not fucked me over as prices have gone higher and I keep rewarding them with more purchases. It’s not just that they have a good value, it’s also that they haven’t tried to exploit me.

We need to ignore the coupons, new catchy deals, and other bullshit that these large corporations are trying to use to lure people back. Corporations should feel lost profits for decades when they tarnish their brand by fucking over customers and we need to vote with our wallets to show their greed also showcases a lack of business acumen.

Moorshou ,

Thank you for making this informative post, I can now look for bullshit more effectively.

Sam_Bass ,

Unfortunately, there is no real oversight to regulate, let alone prevent price gouging. The only option available to anyone is to not buy. Many of the commodities vendors basically ‘know’ that people wont exercise that option, so they firmly believe in the legitimacy of what theyre doing. For any meaningful change to occur we absolutely must tighten our purse strings for the long haul to demonstrate that it is we who are keeping them alive.

melbaboutown , (edited )

I don’t know what to say other than that I agree with you. Dominant retailers (especially supermarkets) were and are profiteering during a crisis and these ‘prices drops’ of cents are merely a sop.

At this point a fair few people can’t even afford some of those goods

MockingMoniker ,

We shut everything down, but we did not stop consuming. It’s the law of supply and demand. Next time, no shutdown.

bfg9k ,

Next time, just fucking die so I can consume.

MockingMoniker ,

People need the economy to survive. We killed a lot of poor people.

Daxtron2 ,

Prices have gone down? I just paid 90 dollars for like 3 days of groceries

StaySquared ,

brb When you buy 1 large pizza with 1 topping and an extra large with no toppings plus half a dozen garlic bread… and your bill is nearly $70.

Dafuq happened?

Oh wait, no… I forgot, we all know what happened. If you have to ask, that’s on you.

kandoh ,

It’s interesting isn’t it? If society as a whole does better and we all get some extra money to spend then people get greedy and begin jacking up their prices to restore a previous status quo.

It seems clear that an effective government would’ve stepped in to stop the price gouging but that goes against our neoliberal leaders worldview.

UnderpantsWeevil ,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

Its worth recognizing that our quality of life is heavily predicated on the subsidy of cheap labor abroad. As markets move international and these historical serfs begin to move into the consumer side of the market, we’re seeing a rise in global demand. And as big businesses consolidate ownership of real estate and productive capital, we’re seeing a drop in the number of suppliers. That gives the business end of the spectrum enormous leverage. But its only one side of the equation.

This isn’t strictly a problem of profits. Big western states like the US and Canada produce enormous amounts of domestic waste. We’ve monetized that waste, such that you can turn a profit by simply consuming large quantities of excess energy and raw materials, and translate that into paper assets that can be borrowed against in a historically low-interest lending market. But in the end, a big part of the reason everything is getting so expensive is that we’ve been eating our own seed corn.

When you pollute your groundwater with chemical waste from fossil fuels and plastics, that’s going to drive up the cost of agriculture and potable water utilities. When you burn off all the cheap fuels and refuse to invest in green/nuclear alternatives (because fossil fuels generate enormous profit margins and green/nukes don’t) then the cost of energy rises. When you build horizontally rather than vertically, refuse to invest in mass transit, and force everyone to make enormous commutes, real estate starts selling at an exceptional premium.

Yeah, there’s definitely an element of greed in the mix. But it can’t be discounted how much of our domestic wealth is squandered through mismanagement. Americans need twice the income of their German or Korean peers to live half as good, because we do everything so haphazardly.

Hacksaw ,

It’s what we vote for. Everytime someone suggests European solutions they’re branded a communist and we vote in the “greed is good” guy.

RememberTheApollo_ ,

So the “free market” has been so consolidated into large mega-corps that they just price fix now without fear of punishment because they’re too big to fail or have such deep pockets that they own the political landscape.

Free market just means free to squeeze the remaining middle class until there’s nothing left.

Thann ,
@Thann@lemmy.ml avatar

It used to be that only the telecoms and tech companies were consolidated enough to pricefix, now every sector is, and the economy is spiraling downward at record pace.

AngryCommieKender ,

The saddest part is that they’re choosing this. The richest know that they could be paying thriving wages, and get even richer. They know that they could create co-op monopolies and get even richer. They aren’t going for a high score on wealth. They’ve seen the future, and are going for a high score on human suffering and death, because it won’t be possible ever again once the rich are overthrown and we create sensible distribution methods that don’t allow one person to hoard hundreds of millions of people’s worth of resources.

Aceticon ,

It was always about removing any intervention by the powers of the state (which in Democracy are controlled by voters) so that the positive feedback loops in money aggregation in most markets (basically any market with barriers to entry isn’t free, especially if that barrier relates to land ownership, so the more money you make, the more you own, the more money you make) would turn those people who started with the most money - as in a system with such feedback loops in place, starting advantages such as being born rich are unassailable - into oligarchs.

As that system polls wealth in the hands of fewer and fewer, of course it will eventually destroy the middle class and countries ends up looking a lot like dictatorship Brazil in the 70s - only two classes, rich and poor and pretty much nothing in the middle.

mjhelto ,

These are some of the same fuckers who took on bad investments in 2007, knowing the investments were shit, and crashed the worldwide economy in 2008. Millions lost their homes and life savings over night. Then the govt. bailed them out, the poor banks and their little oops, with our money and they laughed all the way into the “too big to fail” book of cock-knobbery.

They don’t care about how we perceive them and a vast number of consumers, sadly, cannot be bothered to go without the creature comforts they enjoy to send a message so nothing will change. Same thing will happen with real estate when that bottom finishes falling out. Too bad consumers gotta pay for the huber of the wealthy.

AngryCommieKender ,

They’re doing it on purpose. They have studies since the '70s that prove that they would be much richer than they are if they would just provide everyone with a thriving wage, and didn’t even need to take a pay cut back then.

They’re so scared of losing their wage slaves that they would rather burn the world than cause less needless suffering.

TokenBoomer ,

Welcome to socialism, comrade.

friend_of_satan ,

It’s basically the corporations hoping for something like “miniplenty malquoted chocolate rectify” and “It appeared that there had even been demonstrations to thank Big Brother for raising the chocolate ration to twenty grams a week. And only yesterday […] it had been announced that the ration was to be reduced to twenty grams a week. Was it possible that they could swallow that, after only twenty-four hours? Yes, they swallowed it.”

unreasonabro ,

Kill Capitalism.

Cowbee ,

For anyone who still thinks Capitalism can be “fixed” and doesn’t need to be fully replaced with Socialism, Wage Labor and Capital is an excellent place to start.

schwim ,

Is there something unbreakable in socialism that keeps it from being exploitable?

Cowbee ,

What do you mean by “exploitable?” Are you asking if Socialism magically removes all problems and functions perfectly? No, it doesn’t, but it does solve the fundamental problems that necessarily exist with Capitalism outlined in Wage Labor and Capital.

schwim ,

I guess what I mean is that it seems like it’s the entities in power and not the political system is what’s causing these atrocities. I imagine they could do just as well if you told them today that they’re doing it under a socialist umbrella. I’ll try to give the linked book a read.

Cowbee ,

Any system can have bad actors, even non-hierarchial ones like Anarchism. Socialism fixes the economic exploitation created by class conflict within Capitalism. Telling Workers that they are actually in Socialism despite being Capitalist doesn’t change anything about exploitation, nor does it solve issues like the Profit Motive, Class Conflict, or the Tendency for the Rate of Profit to Fall.

nickwitha_k ,

I think that you may be mixing up two things here: political systems and economic systems. Capitalism, socialism, and communism are economic systems. Political systems are things like monarchy, republic, and oligarchy.

I will also highly recommend Wage Labor and Capital. I had to study it in university and find that it is a good high-level analysis of the systemic issues in the capitalism. For a deeper analysis from Marx, while he is most known for communism, his magnum opus was really Das Kapital, which is not about communism.

schwim ,

I definitely was due to ignorance, it was not intentional.

That being said, the economic system in place is always at the mercy of those in political power, is it not? I’m not being fecicious, it just seems to me that no matter the conomic system in place, human nature seems to be to find a way to exploit it. I just can’t think of a scenario where that can be protected against.

nickwitha_k , (edited )

It definitely was due to ignorance, it was not intentional.

That means you learned something new today! :D (I don’t mean this in a condescending manner at all - I just love learning and even when it’s vicariously through other people).

That being said, the economic system in place is always at the mercy of those in political power, is it not?

Yes and no. There is a really complex interplay between political and economic systems. Despite this, differentiating between the two types of systems is an important tool for better understand how they work and influence eachother and society.

I’m not being facetious, it just seems to me that no matter the conomic system in place, human nature seems to be to find a way to exploit it. I just can’t think of a scenario where that can be protected against.

That’s a fun thing and you’ve unknowingly underscored a massive flaw in a lot of political and economic theory (especially the later). Humans must be understood through multiple lenses:

  • We are animals; biological entities with material needs to sustain life and drives to reproduce (some exceptions, like ace folks, though arguably, there are more forms of reproduction than biological). Nearly all biological entities pursue some form of reproductive competition/selection. Even the baboons who selected for less aggressive/more cooperative males select against these traits, competing with groups that are not selecting for cooperation. (Further note: I do not say this to mean that I believe that competition “human nature” - there are too many counter-examples but, from a high-level perspective, all organisms are effectively competing, even if, paradoxically against competition.
  • We are not rational actors; humans do incredibly illogical and irrational things all of the time. Many of the popular models championed by supporters of neoliberal capitalism completely fail to account for this, instead, assuming rational self-interest.
  • And many others.

ETA: From my perspective, as one who is cooperatively-minded, the best political and economic systems are the ones that can be currently conceived that result in the greatest benefit to the greatest number of people while providing protection to vulnerable populations and individual agency. I also think that this is a process rather than an endpoint - technology and organisms evolve over time, our social constructs have to do so as well in order to be useful.

AngryCommieKender ,

Relevant XKCD.

xkcd.com/1053/

schwim ,

This was incredibly informational, thank you.

We are not rational actors; humans do incredibly illogical and irrational things all of the time. Many of the popular models championed by supporters of neoliberal capitalism completely fail to account for this, instead, assuming rational self-interest.

I think this has made more sense to me than anything else I’ve read so far as of late. If I am understanding it correctly, Capitalism is sold under the guise that companies will only prioritize profit to the point at which it begins to harm some part of society but no further because we all know that would be bad and we’re not bad people when in reality there are bad people that are ok with doing exactly that.

This seems to me like less of an oversight and more of a “we, as tobacco CEOs do not believe that smoking is addictive”, right? The masses may believe differently but those at the top of these systems, companies and law making entities have to know that what they’re doing is putting profit over humans. Were Europeans any better at implementing Capitalism before or is the system impossible or nearly so to protect against this?

StaySquared ,

Never listen to a person who lives in a capitalist nation, hates capitalism, and thinks lol… socialism is better.

If I truly believe capitalism is evil, I would moved to a non-capitalist nation. All these armchair philosophers are drinking from the teat of capitalism.

Kyrgizion ,

We got robbed blind during the pandemic. Not just in terms of price gouging, mind you. There’s a reason that billionaires’ cumulative wealth went up with the exact same amount it went down for ALL THE REST OF US. 95% of all dollars in existence were “minted” (digitally, ofc) in the last couple of years. That essentially means the dollar in your pocket is already worth just a few CENTS, you just don’t know it yet. But we will.

MrPoopbutt ,

Not to doubt, but 95% seems high. Is there a source?

Kyrgizion ,

You’re correct, 95% is overblown, but it’s still mindboggling: 20% of the total M2 supply was created in 2020 alone, and it has gone up since:

fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2SL

…stackexchange.com/…/were-a-large-fraction-of-us-…

Which still amounts to theft by inflation, which is something the founding fathers warned explicitly about.

prole ,

95%, 20%… whats a 400%+ difference amongst friends on the internet, right?

Kyrgizion ,

20% in 2020 alone. If they kept up the same rate, that would make 80% in 2024 which isn’t THAT far off of 95%.

lemmyman ,

Except…they didn’t keep up that same rate? M2 ij Jan 2020 was about 15.4 trillion, in April 2024 it was 20.9 trillion. So 26% of M2 supply was created since 2020, not 80%, not 95%.

prole ,

95% of all dollars in existence were “minted” (digitally, ofc) in the last couple of years.

No way this is true. Anyway, the act of printing money isn’t the problem here.

AngryCommieKender , (edited )

I see where they are coming from due to the other comments they made. If the various world governments had continued printing money the way they did in 2020, then almost 80%, maybe as much as 85% of the total money supply might have been printed in the last 4 years. That isn’t what happened, and The US should be super fucking pissed about how it happened here, because 95% of the stimulus packages were aimed at the rich, shareholders, and corporations. Normal people were lucky if they got the full $2400 of all three stimulus packages over an 18 month time span. $2400 is only an average of a bit less than 3 months rent on average.

Meanwhile, the corporations got, on average, between $1,500,000 and $100,000,000 during the same time period.

Almost every other country spent the majority of the money on their people, creating an economic boom. If the amount of money printing had happened for the last four years, continuously, then most of the top economic countries in the world would have no poverty or homelessness.

Russia, China, The US, Australia, Great Britain, Canada, and New Zealand don’t count as top economic countries in the world. None of their economies are sustainable, or serve their citizens.

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