Today, Farm Action’s Joe Maxwell will testify before the U.S. Senate Banking Subcommittee on Economic Policy at a live-streamed hearing entitled “Protecting Consumers’ Pocketbooks: Lowering Food Prices and Combatting Corporate Price Gouging and Consolidation” at 2:30 p.m. ET.
This hearing comes on the heels of a letter sent by Senator Elizabeth Warren, who is Chair of the Subcommittee, and Representative Jim McGovern urging the Biden administration to use its executive authority to act to lower food prices as families across the country struggle to afford their groceries — while food industry giants reap record profits.
In his testimony, Maxwell, a Missouri farmer and Chief Strategy Officer for Farm Action, will highlight Farm Action’s work investigating price gouging across the food system, including in the highly consolidated fertilizer, egg, and beef sectors.
Maxwell’s testimony demonstrates how dominant firms have used their market power to extract excessive profits through price gouging during periods of industry-claimed supply disruption and production cost increases:
“Due to today’s heavily concentrated and vertically integrated food and agriculture supply chains, dominant firms no longer need to compete with each other in order to be profitable. Their market power leaves farmers and consumers vulnerable to market abuses: These companies use opportunistic market behavior to set the price they pay farmers and the price they charge consumers with little regard for market dynamics.”
Maxwell’s testimony concludes with a call for the U.S. government “to free itself from the undue influence of corporate special interests and to own its role in safeguarding market accountability and competitiveness in the food and agricultural marketplace.”
More information about the hearing can be found here and Maxwell’s written testimony can be found here. Learn more about Farm Action’s work investigating price gouging here.
Media Contact: Jessica Cusworth, jcusworth@farmaction.us, 202-450-0887
