Biden-Harris administration created inflation. Now Harris wants to fix with price controls

Nobody likes a price-gouger. The challenge is to correctly identify one.   

When a hurricane or tornado sweeps through an area, and the current inventory of building supplies suddenly becomes 50% higher—it’s price gouging. Americans pride themselves on being self-sufficient and prepared for whatever may come their way. But nobody stocks lumber, siding, windows, and shingles in their garage just in case they must deal with a natural disaster. Building suppliers are well aware of this and may take advantage of the emergency. It’s the reason why many states have some type of consumer protection laws.   

In 2018, the average resale price of a concert ticket for the Taylor Swift Reputation Stadium Tour was $157. The average resale ticket price of her current Eras Tour is $3,801. That’s more than a 2,000% increase. It’s not price gouging, though, because it’s not an emergency to see Swift perform live on stage. Rather, it’s classic supply and demand. Swift has reached superstar status. She has many devoted fans and relatively few concert venues.  

Let’s talk groceries. They’ve gone up 20% under the Biden-Harris administration. If Vice President Kamala Harris wins the 2024 presidential election, she plans to fix that with a federal ban on price gouging on groceries.  

Grocery stores have an average net profit of a thin 1.6%. Prices are high right now because of inflation. Inflation is high because of the current administration’s policies of unnecessarily flooding an already recovering economy with trillions of new dollars. People temporarily had more money and greater purchasing power. More goods flew off the shelves. Fewer goods remained. Prices rose for those fewer goods.  

It’s classic supply and demand. Caused by inflation. Caused by the Biden-Harris administration.  

Harris’ planned meddling with grocery store prices may force grocers to take a loss on some items and could cause stores to fail.  

The top four grocery providers in this country make up 50% of all grocery sales. They are Walmart, Inc., The Kroger Company, Costco Wholesale Corporation, and Albertsons. If Harris’ planned price controls go into effect, the next thing that may happen is that “too big to fail” grocery chains could receive government bailout money. It’s not that big of a reach and wouldn’t be the first time that the government bailed out a struggling industry.  

The grocery store business is a $1 trillion industry. Trillion—no small number—seems to be the favorite giveaway of this administration. The American Rescue Plan cost $1.9 trillion. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act cost $1.2 trillion. It’s estimated that the Inflation Reduction Act will cost about $1 trillion.   

The Biden-Harris team flooded the economy with trillions of (taxpayer) dollars which created inflation. Inflation created higher grocery prices paid by consumers (taxpayers). Harris’ plan to implement price controls may create store closures and maybe even a government (taxpayer) bailout of too big to fail grocery chains.   

Fiscally concerned taxpayers want off this merry-go-round, and they keep good company.  

Milton Friedman, a former Nobel Prize winner for excellence in economics and author of, “Capitalism and Freedom,” stated, “Price controls, whether legal or voluntary, if effectively enforced would eventually lead to the destruction of the free enterprise system and its replacement by a centrally controlled system. And it would not even be effective in preventing inflation. History offers ample evidence that what determines the average level of prices and wages is the amount of money in the economy and not the greediness of businessmen or of workers.” 

Jason Furman, a top economist in the Obama administration, concurs, “This is not sensible policy, and I think the biggest hope is that it ends up being a lot of rhetoric and no reality. There is no upside here, and there is some downside,” 

And Michael Strain, director of economic policy studies at The American Enterprise Institute, adds that the state laws are typically triggered by specific emergencies and limited to certain goods for a limited amount of time. “That’s just very different than empowering Linda Kahn and the Federal Trade Commission to determine prices in a much less targeted, time-limited, or restrictive manner.” 

Our parents taught us that two wrongs don’t make a right. The Biden-Harris administration caused inflation. Price controls will not fix it.   

Sometimes high prices are caused by price gouging during times of natural disasters or other emergencies. We have state laws for that.  

Other times, high prices are caused by inflation—the product of poor policy making.  

We have elections for that.