Democratic lawmakers accuse companies of shrinking product sizes while charging consumers the same price

Democratic lawmakers accuse companies of shrinking product sizes while charging consumers the same price

It’s becoming a common experience for Americans going to the grocery store: your bag of chips seems lighter, your favorite drink comes in a slimmer bottle, and you’re running out of laundry detergent more quickly than usual. And yet things are staying the same price.

On Monday two Democratic lawmakers launched an attempt to get to the bottom of the phenomena, accusing three major companies, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and General Mills, of shrinking the size of products while charging consumers the same price – a price-gouging practice known as “shrinkflation”.

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“Shrinking the size of a product in order to gouge consumers on the price per ounce is not innovation, it’s exploitation,” Warren and Dean said in a statement. “Unfortunately, this price gouging is a widespread problem, with corporate profits driving over half of inflation.”

  • treefrog@lemm.ee
    52·
    1 month ago

    Shrink flation is a form of price gouging because it’s deceptive.

    Before inflation hit I bought the same brand of chips for over a year. The company both raised the prices and reduce the size of the container.

    Effectively raising the price on me twice while hiding half of the price increase.

    Once I saw that they had reduced the size of the bag of chips by 20%, and had tried to price gouge me, I switched to a different brand of chips.

    Some inflation is going to happen naturally and I accept that. But this was not natural inflation where corporations had to raise the prices. It was greed.

    The initial price increase was enough to cover inflation. The rest went to shareholders. If the price increase had been fair, they wouldn’t have hid it behind shrinkflation.

    • iopq@lemmy.world
      11·
      1 month ago

      Price gouging is a pejorative term used to refer to the practice of increasing the prices of goods, services, or commodities to a level much higher than is considered reasonable or fair by some.

      Nothing to do with deceptive packaging.

      It was greed

      They can just raise the prices more

      The rest went to shareholders

      The rest always goes to shareholders. You imagine inflation going like this:

      Price is $4, so it’s sold for $5. When the price goes to $6, it’s sold for $7

      Inflation actually goes like this:

      When the price is $6, it’s sold for $7.50 because shareholders don’t like lower margins