Occupy Underground
Related: About this forumCorporate greed, not wages, is behind inflation. It's time for price controls
The underlying economic problem is profit-price inflation. Its caused by corporations raising their prices above their increasing costs.
Corporations are using those increasing costs of materials, components and labor as excuses to increase their prices even higher, resulting in bigger profits. This is why corporate profits are close to levels not seen in over half a century.
Corporations have the power to raise prices without losing customers because they face so little competition. Since the 1980s, two-thirds of all American industries have become more concentrated.
Why are grocery prices through the roof? Because just four companies control 85% of meat and poultry processing. Just one corporation sets the price for most of the nations seed corn. And two giant firms dominate consumer staples.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/sep/25/inflation-price-controls-robert-reich
Probatim
(3,014 posts)doc03
(36,695 posts)totally backfired causing shortages of everything. If producers can't make money on a product they don't make it.
What broke inflation was the Fed raising interest rates, that caused by far the worse recession in my lifetime. I was
out of work for 3 1/2 years along with millions of others. But it was followed by years of record growth. I think the
best thing we could do is break our dependance on oil.
I_UndergroundPanther
(12,934 posts)Price control and get rid of dependence on oil?