Fighting Corporate Monopoly Power
THE PROBLEM: CORPORATIONS HAVE TOO MUCH POWER
Big corporations have too much power to influence our economy. Companies like Amazon have grown exponentially in the years since the pandemic, but as their profits have skyrocketed, they’ve gone to shareholders, not workers.
Meanwhile, working families in New York are struggling to survive. The cost of living is high, and wages aren’t going up fast enough to suffice.
So how do corporate profits continue to increase? When corporations are rich enough to merge with and acquire other companies, monopolize more markets, and bury their competition, they gain outsized power to raise prices and drive inflation. We’ve seen this firsthand during the pandemic, or when avian flu-related egg shortages led to skyrocketing prices. Companies raised prices higher than they needed to — just a handful of corporations control the egg market, and reports show that they raised prices more than enough to make up for the shortage, to the tune of billions in profits.
THE SOLUTION: OUTLAW CORPORATE GREED
Our affordability crisis doesn’t exist in a vacuum — it’s fueled by corporate greed. New York needs a healthy economy that works for everyone, not just the Amazons of the world.
We need to rein in monopoly power and regulate big corporations so they can’t corner the market and make all the rules.
WHAT WE’RE FIGHTING FOR
The 21st Century Antitrust Act (S335/A2015) would empower New York to penalize corporations for unfair price gouging and other monopolistic practices.
The bill establishes guardrails to keep competition healthy so no one corporate monopoly has the power to set prices or the conditions of our economy, such as allowing small businesses, consumers, and workers to sue large corporations for predatory behavior.
The Act would also empower New York’s Attorney General to review proposed mega-mergers and the impact that they would have on consumers and jobs, and when appropriate, block them.