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With few one-sided features and little hope that Congress will pass legislation, the president’s early investment in festival politics may pay political dividends.
By Jim Tankersley
Jim Tankersley is a journalist who covers White House politics.
An independent federal firm has emerged as one of the most trusted enforcers of President Biden’s attempts to fight inflation, at a time when the White House has few weapons of its own to reduce stubbornly high costs for consumer staples such as food.
The Federal Trade Commission filed a lawsuit Monday, joined by several state attorneys general, challenging a merger between supermarket giants Kroger and Albertsons. The agency’s reasoning is echoed in many tactics that Biden blamed on corporate greed for emerging costs and declining quantities in supermarket aisles.
“If approved, this merger would particularly reduce competition, likely causing Americans to pay millions of dollars more for food and other household items,” company officials wrote in a lawsuit. Because food costs have risen dramatically in recent years, they added, “The stakes for Americans are exceptionally high. “
This is true for consumers, but also for the president. Americans are more likely to disapprove of his handling of the economy than to approve. Consumer confidence, while improving in recent months, remains weak for an economy with low unemployment and forged expansion like the one Biden presided over.
Internal research by White House economists suggests that nothing weighs more heavily on customer confidence than food prices. These prices skyrocketed in 2022 and have not decreased, although their pace of increase has slowed.
White House officials admit that Biden can’t do much more unilaterally to lower food costs, let alone get legislative action from Congress. That’s why Biden has resorted to the bully pulpit, calling on retail outlets to cut costs and berating snack makers for engaging in “shrinkflation” — reducing quantities while increasing or maintaining costs.
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