Subsidies are not to promote a free market, but to secure production.

And price controls are not to promote a free market but to reign in corporate greed. I could absolutely not spare a moment of concern for whether they are "anti free market."

They have plenty of margin to work with, and the gig has been up about their "supply chain costs" excuse they started pulling during the pandemic for quite some time now.

Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan is pushing for an inquiry into the ongoing surge in grocery prices that started during the Covid-19 pandemic and that remains a hot topic in this year’s presidential election.

On Thursday, during a virtual public meeting hosted by the FTC and the Department of Justice, Khan said the probe would “shed light” on why prices and profits at grocery chains “remain so high even as costs appear to have come down.”

“We want to make sure that major businesses are not exploiting their power to inflate prices for American families at the grocery store,” she said.

Puh. They absolutely ARE and HAVE BEEN exploiting their power to inflate prices.

Between grocery prices, fast food shenanigans, and shrinkflation, anyone with little enough disposable income to be at all conscious of prices has known for a long while that these companies have picked the pandemic as their excuse to pull in as much money hand over fist as they possibly can, all while fighting tooth and nail against wage increases to even approach the overall rate of inflation across the same period of time.

From the first link in that para:

TheStreet reported that Medium French Fries went from $1.79 in 2019 to $4.19 in 2024, a 134.1 percent increase. A McChicken went from $1.29 to $3.89, a 201.6 percent hike.

The price of the beloved Big Mac increased 87.7 percent, from $3.99 to $7.49. An order of 10 McNuggets rose by 68.8 percent, from $4.49 to $7.58. Of the five popular products examined, cheeseburgers saw the largest price increase—going from $1 to $3.15, a 215 percent spike.

These increases exceed the general average for inflation calculated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which shows that prices went up by about 21.5 percent between the end of 2019 and March 2024.

From the second link in that para:

Few details were released about the change, but Wendy’s CEO Kirk Tanner said the new menus will let the fast food chain test “more enhanced features like dynamic pricing and day-part offerings along with AI-enabled menu changes and suggestive selling.”

“We expect our digital menu boards will drive immediate benefits to order accuracy, improve crew experience and sales growth from upselling and consistent merchandising execution,” Tanner said on the call.

Surge pricing could be a “turning point” in the industry, according to Jonathan Maze, editor-in-chief of trade publication Restaurant Business. “If Wendy’s idea works, it could get others to do something similar, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see another chain or two test the idea themselves, given what Wendy’s is doing.”

Fuck you Wendy's. You've been a favorite since I was 12, and I tried to ignore your decreasing quality in recent years. You are dead to me now. (Yes, I know they rolled the idea back after they heard what the announcement did to the pitchfork futures market.)

From the third link in that para:

Frito-Lay shrank bags of some of its Dorito's from 9.75 ounces to 9.25 ounces. Bags in both of these sizes, as well as some 9.5-ounce bags, are currently for sale at Target for the same price. "We took just a little bit out of the bag so we can give you the same price and you can keep enjoying your chips," a Frito-Lay spokesperson told Quartz.

Fuck you Frito-Lay, what kind of Orwellian doublethink is this?

Anti-Free market indeed. Free market in this country no longer means anything other than unrestrained corporate greed.