The Professor of skim, scam and fraud

Investment Analysis Clubs Macro Economic Trends and Risks
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{{ Mr. Wu is a law professor who studies how companies manipulate customers, extract wealth and deepen inequality. }}

Price Gouging Is Real. Doing Nothing Is Not the Answer.

free link:
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/17/opinion/price-gouging-mamdani.html?unlocked_article_code=1.NVA.UINW.Th2ojmJhwMlP&smid=url-share

{{ Since 2016, price gouging has become an even more pressing issue. Businesses across industries are increasing profits by exploiting what economists call situational market power — the ability to raise prices when there’s limited choice or urgent need. (Think of a convenience store that doubles the price of bottled water after a natural disaster.) The fact that companies now have access to and can analyze so much personalized data is improving their extraction capabilities. If a grocery-delivery app can tell that you must have Skippy peanut butter, why not raise the price just for you? Companies increasingly know exactly when they have pricing power and how best to exploit it. }}

This apparently also works in the reverse.

The closest supermarket to my home is Safeway, which has uniformly higher prices than Wilco, about 3 miles away. I do the majority of my shopping at Wilco, but will buy something at Safeway if it’s on sale and cheaper than Wilco.

Every week I get an e-mail from Safeway with one or two items I routinely buy at a price dramatically lower than Wilco. This week it’s Iceberg Lettuce for $1.54 (Wilco’s price was $2.98 yesterday.)

intercst

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Supply and demand, supply and demand. If ya got a jones for Skippy then ya pay for it.

DB2

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Sure. But you also have 40 plus years of market concentration, lack of antitrust enforcement, and crony capitalism.

intercst

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Safeway loss leaders pull me away from shopping at Walmart. Focus on meat – that’s where the big bucks are. Safeway often has a sale on a 2-pack of ground beef that can easily be frozen. By careful shopping I can save 25% or more off a grocery cart.

But I also arrive early at Walmart on Thursday morning to catch the overnight meat mark-downs.

Vegan? Not hardly!
Wendy

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Question - Are you referring to a Wilco Farm Store,

https://www.farmstore.com

or an employee-owned WinCo Foods store :thinking: ?

https://www.wincofoods.com

We’ve discovered that during the Fall, the WinCo we shop in Vancouver sources their corn-on-the cob from a grower located on Lower River Road. The corn is farm-to-table delicious without having to wait until Saturday to shop at Vancouver Farmers’ Market: https://vancouverfarmersmarket.org

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Yep. I’ve got 10 lbs of frozen Safeway 80/20 ground beef in the freezer.

But Fred Meyer’s ground beef sale is 50 cents cheaper this week.

intercsf

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WinCo foods, I’ve got two of them within a 3 mi radius of my home. Sorry for the typo.

intercst

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…and I always carefully eye the discounted meats at my closest Costco here in Mexico. Often the deals are mind blowing.

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At Sam’s I notice they mark meat down 24% on day two. You can find some bargains there.

I will make a special trip to the store when I can save $3.

But grocery stores here are dropping mailed and newspaper ads. You have to remember to check on line ad. Less convenient.

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So I went to Kroger, and as I was out of English muffins I bought a package of 6. And because they were out of the kind of cottage cheese Mrs. Goofy prefers I went another half mile up the road to Publix, where I found them selling the exact same English muffins for a BoGo, so I bought one and got a free one because I was pisse3d.

I now have 3 packagesa of English muffins. I eat about one English muffin per week.

There are times when my logic ain’t logical.

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Our primary store is Wegmans. Not the cheapest, but quality is generally high. They have a great selection of produce and fruit (a big part of our diet). We rarely eat red meat and focus on chicken, salmon, and turkey.

We love Costco, but shopping there for two is tricky and limited.

We’ll stop in Whole Foods twice a year just to remind us that Wegmans isn’t that pricey.

Trader Joe’s on occasion, just for a few fun goodies.

It would be an understatement to say we’re picky about our food. Especially dark chocolate. :smiling_face_with_sunglasses:

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