The Secret Scam Driving Up Food Prices
Our guest this week helped expose how Pepsi and Walmart work hard to keep prices high, local competition down, and the evidence of their likely collusion secret.
Welcome to the podcast Organized Money. You can listen to today’s episode on Apple on Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
In the twilight of the Biden Administration, FTC Chair Lina Khan filed a price-fixing case against Pepsi, using the powerful but little-enforced Robinson-Patman Act. A few months into Trump’s second term, that lawsuit was dead and buried by the new regime, leaving only a bunch of redacted documents and a lot of questions for the public to pore over.
Our guest today is Stacy Mitchell, the co-executive director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, who recently convinced a judge to release those files. Together, Matt and David break down how Pepsi and Walmart worked together to set “price gaps,” and how similar techniques are used throughout the economy, driving up prices for everyone, even as Walmart gets to take credit for having the lowest prices around.
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Thank you so much for listening. If there’s a monopoly you’d like us to explore this year, or if you have anything else to tell us, please let us know by leaving a comment or by responding directly to this email.