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this post was submitted on 12 Feb 2024
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I don't think he has the power to do anything about it.
And he shouldn’t be able to do much to directly interfere with the market.
However one thing he can do is regulate transparency. A big reason shrinkflation is so widespread is that you can hide the change pretty well, but consumer protection regulations already require clear pricing, including per unit, and at least some semblance of truth in advertising, so additional regulations to improve honesty and transparency are quite appropriate. Government needs to establish a fair market, then it’s up to the market
That may not prevent shrinkflation but at least we can keep products companies from lying about it. Then it’s up to us
What do you mean by transparency? Is it the sort of transparency companies can reveal without revealing things like trade secrets?
Also, with so many Trump-backed judges, I could see that getting struck down in a hot minute, especially if businesses take it to the Fifth Circuit, which they absolutely would.
The classic case of shrinkflation is ever shrinking cans of tuna. However, to the glance, they looked exactly the same. They stacked the same way and difference in height was imperceptible.
While there was a required label for the net weight of contents, why would anyone look when the cans appear to be the same as they always were and how would you notice when there is no prior can to compare to.
This is lying. The companies are clearly misleading consumers to hide price increases even if the information is technically there for someone who looks closely enough.
Consumer transparency means that when you make a change, the difference is clearly visible. Consumer protection should be that companies cannot lie, hide or mislead about this change as they are doing now. A fundamental part of capitalism is that consumers have the information to participate in the market, which requires transparency of products. Capitalism is not just corps exploiting consumers, but an ecosystem of production and consumption where each participant can make choices in their own interest. Being able to lie, hide or mislead is a distortion or abuse of the market and governments role needs to be to stop that so markets can work effectively
So how do you get that through the Fifth Circuit?
We can have all the ideals in the world but dysfunctional is dysfunctional