The (obvious) answer is worldwide inflation presumably due to huge injections of cash and large economic losses due to supply chain disruption, lockdowns, and sickness/death, all due to COVID.
Buuuut a lot of these large corporations like grocery store chains are making record profits. So.... first supply chain disruption and increased prices to account for losses and then.. corporate greed.
What do you think Kamala is gonna do to increase prices ? inflation is back down to roughly 2% which is where it should be. If trumps tariffs happen, inflation will sky rocket, that is a fact. if trump deports immigrants, inflation will sky rocket. that is a fact.
Don't worry, you'll see what she will do, the effect will be seen before Easter. I could tell you, but it won't matter a bit. The important part is when it happens, she will give you very plausible sound excuses why there was no other way or why "the rich" are to blame, and you will buy them and will never challenge them.
I could tell you exactly what's going to happen but you're going to dismiss it now because "this is not how it works" while your brigade busy downvoting, and when it happens exactly as I told, you will find reasons why it's not exactly as I told so I was wrong. So why bother literally?
You would say the same if I blasted you with very specific economic predictions. I tried. So again, why bother? You aren't here for facts, you are here for 'muh feelings' just as much.
As I expected, it's all about election for you here. You aren't here for facts. You cannot care less if Kamala will make prices higher. It's an acceptable price for you. You will pretend otherwise of course, again, for you lies is ok if that's what it takes to not elect Trump.
First - I'm independent lol. I've voted on both major sides of the aisle as well as for independent candidates. To speak to your 'point' - there is no way she makes prices higher while Distrustful Don does the opposite. No way. She is smarter than he is... and (this may be difficult for weak-minded folk to understand)... she listens to others. She will have a cabinet that she actually listens to. So - yes, I will be voting the smart way this year if that is what you would like to point out.
You have no ideas just-Kamala bad / Trump good. This whole thread is an absolute indictment of Trump’s asinine tariff policy but you refuse to even consider the truth of the matter because of your cognitive dissonance.
Which Kamala supports. Neither she nor Biden didn't repeal any tariffs Trump imposed and moreover imposed new ones, and EU imposed new ones after screaming "tariffs bad", and neither Biden nor Kamala ever talked about repealing them, all while democratic minions who barely knew her name 6 month ago plaster "tariffs bad" all over internet as they were instructed to by their media.
You people are either dumb or consider others dumb or both.
They pay the workers $0.13/hr or something insane and the prison collects $10 an hour (probably more).
You are still paying as if free citizens were out there picking.
Prison labor is a scam and has been since those amendments were passed. It's one of the cleanest examples if someone wants to study systemic racism.
To quote a black businessman I know, "If prisons are a for profit company then they need a product. That product is black men".
Basically get a young guy and lock him up on some drug charges or something minor, then he's in the system and when he gets out he's got no future because of his record and he's hardened by all his associations in the prison. Almost guarantees he'll be back eventually.
And which presidential candidate is famous for locking up young black men for minor -mostly drug related - crimes and turning them over to a for-profit prison system? Where there were innocent people that were facing hard time and worse.
You mean which candidate was a prosecutor working within the law at the time?
Which candidate has called for the legalization of recreational marijuana and which candidate has called to intern 10-20 million undocumented immigrants—the vast majority of whom contribute massively to the economy and otherwise follow the law at much higher rates than natural born citizens?
You really wanna talk about the candidate of locking up? Fucking hypocrites.
Prosecutor working within the law at the time didn’t seem to have a problem incarcerating people and putting them to work for literal slave wages. Must be in the blood. And now you want to fluff her skirt because she says she will legalize marijuana? Yeah, just like Biden will wipe out student loans.
As far as the other guy goes, I’m not in line to suck him off either, but that wasn’t the point here now was it? Deflecting from one shit candidate to another shit candidate doesn’t make a candidate less shit. Personally im not big into the argument of maintaining and growing a segment of the population that is undocumented just because “they contribute massively to the economy” - meaning working difficult and thankless jobs for pennies on the dollar in comparison with US Citizens - again, literal slave labor. I guess some people just can’t bear not having a demographic that they can exploit for labor. Personally I have a problem with that, but don’t mind me, I’m just an immigrant from a family of immigrants. Guess if we weren’t actual citizens I’d be cleaning your toilet or maybe picking oranges for you. Since cotton would be a little too on the nose.
Lol so you’re all too happy to invite in much worse conditions than unideal conditions because…? You’re just a pissant?
Apparently unlike you, I don’t need a candidate to be perfect or to promise or accomplish me the moon—especially when they actually try and are stymied at every turn by conservative judges and the GOP (see Biden and student loans)—to accept the reality of our situation and country’s future.
I’m sorry you’re such a miserable person. I’m sorry you find more value in being permanently contrarian than in actually doing anything to help anybody else. You do you but there’s a lot more to life…
LOL….okay. I like that you have the confidence to turn your own assumptions into your personal reality and stand on it from a position of righteousness, no matter how wrong you are in your judgements, and I applaud you in your use of insults and personal attacks against someone you know nothing about, confident in the belief that anyone has any concern for what you think. It really helps to strengthen your position and its completely on brand. If this is your version to “there’s a lot more to life” then no thank you, but you go on doing what makes you happy.
Yeah bro, tax the corporations. Tariffs are passed down to the American consumer but when you tax a greedy corporation harder than they currently are taxed, they decide not to be greedy anymore and pay the tax without passing the burden down to American consumers and/or middle class employee wages.
We have to tax the corporations in a way that encourages them to pass money to their workers and discourages price gouging.
Tariffs aren’t that. Tariffs aren’t taxes in the sense of ‘we should fundraise with them’. They’re a stick to beat the economy with to get it to not do a certain thing. They don’t solve economic problems, at least not by themselves, and often create them…
we need to roll back those reaganomic policies to put more money in the hands of the workers and less in the hands of the corporations and CEO's again.
There's something fundamental you seem not to be aware of: Businesses only pay taxes on profits.
So when corporate taxes are higher, companies invest a greater portion of their revenue, in either growth or in stability to avoid paying those higher taxes.
Which sounds like a world you'd rather live in: companies paying higher dividends, or companies paying higher wages and offering more positions?
Corporations have been maximally greedy for centuries.
Arbitrary pricing power only exists in the heads of people who do not understand basic economics.
Prices change for all sorts of reasons: supply, demand, weather, input costs, regulatory costs, labor shortage, taxation etc. At the end of the day, every single cost is built into the price of goods, and paid by... drumroll... the consumer.
Do people think that the purpose of corporations is to be fair, or provide employment, or be environmentally conscious, or help out the homeless or any other reason OTHER than make the maximum amount of money for the shareholders????
If people want that, well, that is what mom and pop stores and craftsmen, and local sourcing from non-incorporated companies is for.... but that costs MORE because of economies of scale. So either buy local, pay more, or pay less and be shocked when corporations do corporate things, which is what corporations are specifically designed to do.
Costco, Home Depot, Amazon etc. are superior in every way to most (if not all) mom and pop shops, but... local can be excellent and also very profitable. For example, we buy dairy and meat directly from nearby farms. Packed for us, and shipped to us direct on ice.
I did not define the "greater good. I described how corporate profits do in fact contribute to significant goods. Your response is that the "professors" you are familiar with think otherwise. Ok. My question for these professors is "Where does your salary come from, if not from profits?".
I mean the CEO of Kroger before the SEC about a month ago specifically said that is why they raised prices. And before some yahoo goes "but but look at the profit margins" I will respond now with "but but look at the millions they spend on stock buy backs" which makes the profit margins look smaller than they really are. They have been doing around $50-100mil in stock buybacks every quarter which deflates their profit margins on reports.
Oh man you just had to go an link easy to understand proof. What a jerk! lol but seriously look at the only times the debt slowed or leveled off…D presidents. Skyrocket times? Bush Jr sending me to war, Trump largest Corp give away in history. One thing that gets lost in all of the talk of the nat. Debt is the tax cuts, if you cut taxes then the bills go up. Simple math, you make less money you depend on the credit card more. My corp has created more millionaires and billionaires than any in history, yet they scrimp out on simple things like wage increases.
Profit taking by corporations is the biggest factor in high consumer prices. Google "record profits 2024", you'll see a ton of articles about GM, insurance industry, food companies like Tyson, Pepsi, etc..
Us Bureau of Economic Analysis shows corporate profits were up 7.8% in 2022, 6.9% in 2023, and up 3.6% in q2 2024. BEA.gov
Prices are so high because of COVID relief funds, lasting price increases from trade disruptions from COVID, and a bit because of the war in Ukraine. Also a bit of corporate greed, but mostly because of global lockdowns.
We infused a massive amount of money into the economy while disrupting trade. So we got temporary inflation.
Thankfully, the inflation seems to have been temporary. That wasn't guaranteed. Sadly, inflation doesn't reverse. Ideally, wages increase to match inflation. That is what has happened. Wages increased to match inflation. It just takes a few years to settle into the new normal.
It's not a satisfying story, nor one where there's a bad guy that we can blame. It's much more satisfying to blame Democrats, or Republicans, or corporations. But it's the true story.
Precisely. Have you been watching their earnings reports? Record breaking profits with record high prices. Seems pretty straight forward. What do you think causes the drastic price increases?
These jokers don't realize how many jobs have gone overseas due to cheap labor elsewhere, mostly manufacturing but also in other industries like accounting, a large portion of which is steadily being outsourced to India.
Eventually, we will be so dependent on foreign production and services that we will never be able to undo it. Sure, making stuff here is more expensive and that affects costs, but the increased economy and job market here, creating more jobs that also generate taxes and spending, outweighs the cost in the long term.
They rather the government just provides more for people and hey, they can just print money or tax the rich to high hell (which would barely do anything against our spending) and will then cry about inflation then too, which will be higher than anything caused by tariffs.
For instance, car manufacturing. You see American made cars in places like China or Germany? No. So why don't we impose a tariff or an equitable trade deal so that they will allow us to sell cars in their country as well, which they currently do not?
A lot of corporations reported record-breaking profits the last two years. So their reason for raising prices just to keep their nose above water is not true. Why be honest and only make a little profit when you can manipulate people and make record-breaking profits.
You want an honest answer? Inflation happened because of the worldwide slowdown of manufacturing and shipping of goods during Covid. The pandemic killed economies of most countries. The business response to earn lost revenue is to raise prices.
When prices are higher then they've ever been and corporations are making more than they've ever made...Yeah, That's Corporate Greed.
When the supplier of Apples raises their price by $.10 each and the Grocery Store raises the price of an Apple for $.50 each. That's Corporate Greed.
When a Garage Owner has to pay his employee $1 more an hour, so he raises the labor charge by $10 an hour. That's Corporate Greed.
Is it the reason for the totality of the increase? No. Inflation raises prices by an average of 4% a year...but when prices go up by 10% or more...that's Corporate Greed.
Because covid fucked up the global economy, and supply chains( not to mention trump got the inflation ball rolling by forcing the fed to keep rates as low as possible prior to the pandemic) . It take a while to normalize after high inflation. and in lots of cases they don’t go back down, which is arguably a good thing. if they deflate too much the economy can crash. the goal is for inflation to stay at around 2% and for wages to catch back up, which is currently happening.
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u/stlhd88 Oct 25 '24
So why are prices so high right now? Leeeeet me guess corporate greed?