Now, a dozen eggs will cost you around $4, thanks to Kamala Harris' inflationary policy.

That's a viral clip of J.D. Vance at a grocery store in Pennsylvania this week blaming Kamala Harris for the price of eggs rising to $4, while standing in front of price tags that clearly say the eggs are $2.99.

And I know this seems like a pretty minor lie in the scope of J.D. Vance lies, like the immigrants eating pets thing that he will not allow to die despite zero proof that it's happening.

However, I think it's important to talk about in the context of unconscionably huge price increases happening at the grocery store that is a huge talking point for most Americans at the moment.

Vance is pouncing on that frustration by trying to blame Harris for these prices.

But who's to blame, really?

And which candidate, upon entering the White House, has promised policies that will actually make a difference at the grocery store checkout for everyday Americans?

Because what J.D. Vance wants you to believe, and what the actual truth is, is, per usual, very different.

Let's get into it.

Did you guys see this headline?

Trump pledges to prosecute those he considers cheating in election if he wins.

Yikes.

This is a great example of how differently the media reports on headlines depending on their bias.

You can see that the left is highlighting the threats and presenting Trump as extreme and dangerous, while the right focuses on election integrity.

For example, the Daily Wire's headline says, as though threatening to prosecute lawyers and voters is just Trump demanding fair elections.

Meanwhile, Mother Jones' headline reads,

Very different take.

My partner on today's video, Ground News, is a great tool for understanding the news.

To follow along, scan the QR code or go to ground.news.com.

Ground News provides helpful context for these starkly different headlines about the same story.

You can see the overall bias distribution of the news sources covering this story.

Lots of left and center sources are covering it, but only 11% of right-leaning sources, meaning this likely isn't on the radar of your racist uncle Rick, who only watches Fox News.

On the right, you can see the overall factuality rating of the sources, and most have high factuality.

Seeing factuality ratings like this, along with who owns the source, can be really helpful to provide more context to your own echo chamber.

You and your social media may have had one reaction to something Trump said, but it's important to understand the larger picture and what people outside your bubble are saying.

And I'm able to get all this context and information thanks to Ground News.

And with the U.S. election fast approaching, my favorite Ground News feature at the moment is their 2024 U.S. election-focused Blind Spot feed.

I can easily step out of my echo chamber and understand how partisan narratives shape reality and votes.

I'm always really impressed with Ground News and genuinely think they're a great resource for identifying biases in the media.

So scan my QR code, click the link in the description, or go to ground.news.lija to get 40% off the same vantage plan I use to stay informed, which comes to about $5 a month.

Subscribing to Ground News directly supports my channel, so I can continue to make videos for you.

Thanks, Ground News.

Price gouging is the term of the day when it comes to grocery store prices.

There's not a precise definition, and it means different things to different people, but the basic concept is that food companies are able to take advantage of the monopolies they have over their industries and use scarcity, either real or fabricated scarcity, to artificially bump up the prices and pass the cost on to the consumer.

We'll discuss the mechanics of this and how and why it's happening, but it's important to also point out that it's not just major food companies that have caused inflation over the last few years.

Supply chain issues caused by the pandemic, conflicts affecting the price and availability of oil like the war in Ukraine, and all of us sitting around at home not spending our money and collecting stimulus checks during the pandemic sent inflation soaring.

As I've said in past episodes, much of what happens in the economy is out of the control of the president.

Presidents tend to be given far more credit or blame than they deserve for the economy.

And Harris is, of course, the vice president, which, as I've said in previous episodes as well, does not come with a whole lot of power.

She's not the one writing laws or signing laws.

She does have a tie-breaking vote in the very divided Senate, but what she does and does not get to vote on and the policies promoted by the Biden administration are very out of her control.

But of course, Vance and Trump's entire argument is that Harris is simply a continuation of Biden.

And look at how much you've suffered under Biden.

Harris will just continue your suffering.

And the economy is, of course, an easy scapegoat to point to, despite the fact that how it fares is generally outside the control of the president.

Trump points to Biden as the worst president ever for the economy and says that he was the best president ever for the economy, despite the fact that unemployment rose to highs not seen since the Great Depression under Trump's watch, that the unemployment rate spike was largely caused by the pandemic, which Trump bungled on the response but did not have much control over initially, is further proof that how well or poorly the economy does during a four-year term isn't usually directly influenced by the president.

That being said, we have seen presidents put other people in place whose policies have ripple effects.

Reagan did ruin everything, after all, and part of that was because of his theory of trickle-down economics.

Reagan, of course, did not come up with that concept, but he was a handy, charismatic puppet of the free market economists who put the idea in his head.

So while we shouldn't give too much credit to any one president for how the economy fared during their tenure, it is worth taking a look at who they're surrounding themselves with and the types of policies they're putting in place that may have far-reaching impacts that aren't immediately obvious.

So yes, there has been inflation under Biden.

It peaked in around 2022 and has been falling, and we're almost down to pre-pandemic levels now.

But the prices at the grocery store remain high, and that's something we all feel every day, so it is the most obvious indicator of continued issues with inflation, which is why JD Vance went to a grocery store in Pennsylvania this week and tried to blame imaginary $4 eggs on Harris.

Eggs are $4 in some places, but in that grocery store, they were not.

He's tapping into the most tangible indicator of inflation that we interact with every week.

And during the same time that inflation was soaring to 13% or more, major companies were reporting record profits and bragging about how much they are able to charge us.

Researchers at the Liberal Groundwork Collaborative in Washington produced a report in January calculating that corporate profit margins accounted for about half of American inflation in the second half of 2023.

Yikes. And corporate apologists will say, well, that's just how economics works.

Demand went way up. That's economics 101.

Low supply plus high demand equals people will pay a premium.

And we're all supposed to say, ah, well, that explains it.

It's just how economics works, and I'm a big dum-dum for being mad about that.

And then the conversation ends there for people who rest cozy in the arms of unfettered capitalism.

The problem with the grocery price question specifically is that corporations were recording major profit margins because people were buying food because of the demand for food.

People were like, please, sir, can I have some eggs?

And corporations were like, ha ha, gotcha. Free market economics, baby.

Now, despite what some commenters on these episodes seem to think about me or wish for me to believe in,

I'm not interested in demolishing the entire system and participating in a full socialist revolution.

I'd say I'm a democratic socialist.

Capitalism isn't great, but no other system humans have come up with and executed has been great either.

And likely the most marginalized among us would be the ones to suffer the most in the great uprising that armchair philosophers on the internet who've read Marx one time seem to be lusting after.

So I'm of the persuasion that capitalism, in order to not be completely exploitative and to ensure the well-being of everyone, must exist within some very strong guardrails.

And ever since Reagan, those guardrails have been extremely absent.

Specifically, I'm talking regulations, especially antitrust regulations, getting rid of monopolies and preventing new ones from forming.

And our food supply system is absolutely f***ing riddled with monopolies, which means that it's not pure and simple supply and demand economics 101.

Because in those theories, which they are just theories on paper, by the way, the rest of us exist in the real world, and so we need to come up with real-world solutions.

In those theories, there's also competition to keep supply and demand in check.

When one company artificially lowers the supply to create scarcity with the hope that the high demand will mean they can charge more for their wares, another company can pop up and say, hey, we can produce these wares for cheaper and pass the savings on to the consumer.

But over the last 40 years, without the guardrails of antitrust legislation being effectively enforced, anytime that new company pops up with the promise of reasonable prices or higher quality products, the existing company can just buy them up.

So the competition that's supposed to keep everyone in check no longer exists, and they can do whatever they want to do.

And monopolies are bad everywhere, but they're especially egregious and sinister when the monopolies involve the things necessary for sustaining human life, like food and shelter.

Another common corporate apologist argument is that as inflation has gone up, so too have worker wages, and the cost of labor is just so high, you guys.

They have to pass the expenses on to the consumers because our CEO needs $10 million so bad right now, you guys.

This despite raging income inequality, leaving CEOs with salaries 344 times higher than the typical worker as of 2022.

For comparison, in 1965, CEOs made 21 times more than the typical worker.

Since 1978, CEO compensation has gone up 1,209% compared with a 15.3% increase in the typical worker's compensation.

Since 1978.

According to the Economic Policy Institute, the overall economy would suffer no harm if CEOs were paid less or taxed more, and most workers would see gains.

And I would venture a guess, most grocery store shoppers would also see price decreases at the checkout line.

And this is just one example of many I could throw at you, where we have it so incredibly twisted in America when it comes to businesses versus consumers, workers, and everyday people.

The business is always seen as the victim.

These poor businesses, they can't handle the demands of increased wages.

Oh no, these poor businesses are victims of this global pandemic.

Let's give them big handouts.

And of course, I think small businesses do form and have formed the backbone of America.

The big businesses, though, always win in the end and always receive the greatest amount of governmental protection from being victims of paying their workers.

Maybe this is radical and crazy of me to say, but if your business model doesn't include paying your workers a fair wage and it can't handle the financial stress of that expectation, maybe you have a sh** business model.

Or if the only way you can possibly pay your workers more is by buying out all your competition and breaking antitrust laws, yeah, that's a sh** business model, my dude.

You can't play by the rules. You're bad at the game.

So instead, they just buy out our politicians to rewrite the rules or overlook the rules so they can pretend they're not really bad at the game that they're playing.

Your CEO doesn't need 20 million dollars.

That's a stupid business model.

It's driven by greed, not economic theory.

And when that greed affects everyday people's ability to get the basic things to sustain human life, that's when it becomes absolutely heinous.

And that's where we're at with the food industry in America.

It's so bad, you guys.

Our food system in this country is f***ed.

At every single level.

Allow me to elaborate.

A 2021 study by The Guardian showed the stark state of our food industry.

They found that for 85% of the products that you see on your grocery store shelves, four corporations or fewer controlled more than 40% of the market share in each food category.

For almost a third of shopping items, the top companies controlled at least 75% of the market share.

So, for example, three companies own 73% of the market for breakfast cereals.

That's General Mills, Kellogg, and Post.

Three companies own 93% of the market for soda.

Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, and Keurig Dr. Pepper, which is all one company.

PepsiCo also owns 88% of the market share for dips, including Tostitos, Lay's, and Fritos.

Those are all the same company.

That's not competition.

For shoppers, it might seem like an overwhelming number of choices when you show up at the grocery store, but most of our favorite brands are actually owned by a handful of food giants, including the ones that I just listed, plus Kraft Heinz, General Mills, ConAgra, Unilever, and Del Monte.

Because it's not just the major grocery stores that are forming monopolies and driving up prices, though they're doing that too, with the latest attempted merger between Albertsons and Kroger under heavy federal scrutiny and lawsuits.

It's every step of the supply chain, from the people who grow our food, to the people who process it, to the stores that shelve it.

Everything is getting monopolized by a few large corporations who are then vertically integrating, meaning they're buying out not only their competitors within, say, the grocery store industry, but also buying manufacturers, so they own the manufacturing processes as well, creating mega companies that have no competition at any level of the production or distribution process, and until recently, very little governmental oversight.

And so they can raise prices while lowering quality and health and worker pay and raking in millions or billions of dollars in revenue and increasing their margins, while the rest of us struggle under the weight of grocery bills that for some people doubled or more in the last few years.

That also means that farmers, what few are left, are at the mercy of giant corporations that own all manufacturing and sales funnels and are able to dictate what farmers can grow and how much money they can make.

Only 15 cents of every dollar you spend at the grocery store goes to the people who grow the food.

The rest goes to the people who process it and market it to us, which means not only are we paying higher prices at the grocery store checkout line that are artificially marked up by megacorporations that answer to no one, it also means that our tax dollars are going to the federal farm subsidies that keep our farmers afloat because these same megacorporations are able to dictate the prices of agricultural products.

Farmers received $424.4 billion in subsidies between 1995 and 2020, of which 49% were for just three crops, corn, wheat, and soybeans.

Corn subsidies are the largest by far, and yet very little corn grown in the U.S.

is eaten in its original form by us these days.

Instead, more than 99% goes into animal feed, additives like corn syrup, and ethanol, which produces toxic air pollutants when burned with gasoline.

And don't even get me started on the environmental degradation we all must live with on this planet because of the horrific effects monocropping, fertilizer, and livestock has on our land, water, and air, all egged on by the megacorporations that control our food system from farm to grocery store.

And on top of that, less than a third of farms, mostly big ones, even benefit from USDA subsidies in part because the system has a long history of discrimination against farmers of color and small farms without the time, resources, or expertise to dedicate to online applications.