Staff Reports
When a Harvard economist, who once danced in the halls of the Obama Administration, throws a wet blanket on Vice President Kamala Harris’ latest scheme, it’s tough to ignore. Jason Furman recently turned heads when he lambasted Harris’ proposal to implement fixed pricing for grocery chains and their suppliers. It seems even some of the left-leaning elites are starting to recognize the folly of government overreach in the economy.
The plan unveiled by Harris is being pitched as a solution to the supposed corporate evil of price gouging, a term that the Biden-Harris Administration has been throwing around as the scapegoat for the inflation that has nearly levied a tax on every American. Harris’ fixation on this boogeyman might sound familiar to anyone who has watched politicians blame external forces for their own mishaps. Leaving aside the inconvenient fact that inflation has been skyrocketing primarily due to the administration’s monetary policies, the fix is a heavy-handed government intervention that has economists shaking their heads in disbelief.
Top Obama Economic Advisor Torches Kamala's Price-Fixing Plan: 'Not Sensible'https://t.co/y2xpMsncaD
— JOSH DUNLAP (@JDunlap1974) August 18, 2024
Furman did not mince words when he pointed out that this proposal is not exactly rooted in sensible economic theory. He posited that the optimism surrounding Harris’ plan might just be a lot of hot air: “likely rhetoric with no reality,” he noted. There’s no hidden benefit here, just potential fallout from a government-driven price control scheme that would turn grocery shopping into a bureaucratic nightmare. Americans, already reeling under inflation, would be handed an even less appetizing menu of rising prices along with an oversized helping of government regulation.
Meanwhile, the Harris campaign attempted to dress up this economic folly in shiny rhetoric, claiming there’s a distinction between fair pricing in competitive markets and “excessive prices.” In reality, it seems the Harris team believes they have the magic wand to judge costs regardless of market forces. News flash: No one elected Washington bureaucrats to set prices or dictate what constitutes “fair.” That’s not how capitalism works, unless Americans are okay with watching their grocery bills skyrocket while dealing with the regulatory grip of the federal government.
Furman isn’t the lone voice against this government overreach. Catherine Rampell, another left-leaning journalist, weighed in with a scathing editorial that laid out the potential disaster of Harris’ price controls. If this sounds familiar, it’s because history has shown time and again that when government gets involved in pricing, chaos ensues. Rampell compared the proposed measures to a sweeping government-enforced price control strategy that makes it clear: forget about supply and demand, now it will be Washington deciding prices. The notion of Kroger being told what to charge for milk by some distant bureaucrat feels like a bad sitcom episode, but if Harris gets her way, it might just become reality.
