'Ripped off by Wall Street': Katie Porter unleashes on GOP for ignoring fundamental principle of capitalism

On Wednesday's edition of MSNBC's "The Beat," Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA) tore into big businesses for gouging consumers to boost profits while hiding behind the shield of global inflation.

This comes shortly after Porter and an economic think tank analyst concurred at a House hearing that data revealed a majority of consumer price hikes are simply going into the pockets of executives and shareholders, rather than to manage supply chain issues or any other inflationary pressure.

"This inflationary period is different," said Porter. "That's what the research shows ... 54 cents of every extra dollar that we are being asked to pay is going to corporate profits. Here's why. The market power of these big corporations has grown. As small businesses, medium-sized businesses have been gobbled up by large businesses, squeezed out by the pandemic, unable to deal with the supply chain issues, the largest corporations, bankrolled by Wall Street have gotten more and more powerful. What we find is that the biggest price-gouging goes on in the very industries where there are the biggest players. Things like Big Oil, where you only have a handful of companies that dominate the market and controlled the supply."

Price-gouging in the oil industry would have a particularly disastrous impact, as higher gas prices have been affecting virtually every sector of the economy by making goods more expensive to transport and store.

"Let's be clear about what pricing power feels like to the mom like me in the grocery store," said Porter. "It feels like getting ripped off by Wall Street. That's exactly what is happening. The American people understand this. They understand that they're being asked to pay more for less product. It's unfair, and it's wrong ... rather than being centered on workers, Republicans have made very clear that if they win back this Congress, the very first thing they're going to do is give Wall Street an even bigger handout in the form of corporate tax cuts. That's not the right direction. What we need to be doing is focusing on increasing competition, which helps consumers pay fair prices."

Watch below or at this link.

Katie Porter on corporate price-gouging www.youtube.com