Price Gouging Is Everywhere — From EVs To Eggs And Presidential Golf Excursions

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Last Updated on: 16th March 2025, 11:59 pm

“I’ll lower your costs on Day 1,” candidate Donald J. Trump exclaimed. Instead, we’re experiencing price gouging and cuts to everyday services. In the same way that we’re not supposed to pay attention to the man behind the curtain in the White House, US residents aren’t expected to be able to discern the difference between rising costs and billionaire payoffs.

The middle class is paying for tax cuts for the über wealthy as the Trump administration dismantles the federal health care program, Medicaid; introduces tariffs, which raise consumer prices; and decimates public education, among other devastating decisions. Trump’s policies seem to be setting us up for another inflation surge, says Nobel Award–winning economist Paul Krugman, and fears of such a “Trumpflation” surge appear to be a major reason for plunging consumer sentiment.

The President-in-Name-Only has sworn to root out corruption within the government, yet one of his first acts as president was to fire over a dozen independent watchdogs who did exactly that. “Let’s be clear: Some people are gonna get hurt, let’s be honest,” former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich said of the Department of Government Efficiency’s broad cuts to federal programs and staff in virtually every agency. Trump continues to insist that short-term pain is necessary for the government stability he will bring over time.

Meanwhile, prices continue to rise, and the administration hasn’t begun to articulate a plan to hold prices in line. Insurance premiums and prescriptions will cost more, because the only way he can balance health programs is to raise consumer costs — and attacks on retirement benefits like Social Security, Medicare, and VA benefits are imminent. They’re not even trying to hide it: Elon Musk called Social Security “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time.”

Here are some of the many ways that price gouging has become a byproduct of Trump administration policies, which have failed US citizens miserably.

EVs: Eighteen-year-old Enza Khoury, cover model for the newly relaunched i-D fashion magazine, was shocked, she said, by the abundance of electric cars in Paris. Around the world, cheaper battery prices are leading to cheaper electric cars, which causes a spike in EV demand. But wait — the average price of an EV in Europe in 2020 was around €40,000 (excluding taxes); today, it’s around €45,000, an 11% jump. Automakers are prioritizing larger, more profitable EVs as part of their profit maximization strategy, rather than focusing on affordable, mass market models.

In the US, legacy automakers also want to generate profits, even at the expense of the climate. Ford, GM, Stellantis, and other US automakers and suppliers had invested nearly $146 billion over three years in the design, engineering, and manufacturing of electric vehicles. They’re walking back timeline implementation dates, for sure, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk has made it clear he will not fight to preserve the $7,500 tax credit for buyers of electric vehicles that is provided by the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. Why? According to our intrepid CleanTechnica writer Steve Hanley, its loss “could bankrupt other automakers in years to come and make him richer, not because it will benefit America. See how this works now? The people get dumped on while the oligarchs get wealthier.”

Eggs are a striking example of price gouging: We know bird flu has caused poultry farmers great losses as they destroy contaminated flocks. It’s so sad. However, egg producer Cal-Maine calculated $1 billion in windfall profits before it saw a single outbreak of H5N1. It sells 1.1 billion eggs per year and owns 43 production facilities. Food and Water Watch’s report, “The Economic Cost of Food Monopolies: The Rotten Egg Oligarchy,” tells the whole story. Cal-Maine’s shareholders especially benefited: the company’s stock is roughly three times as valuable today as it was at the start of the bird flu outbreak.

Grocery industry price gouging: As competition wanes and store sizes increase, MegaGrocers seize more profits than ever before. Giants Kroger and Albertsons admitted to price gouging in a 2024 court case, which struck down a proposed merger between the two corporations. Who’s left to lead the needed intensive enforcement of US antitrust laws to go after corporate price fixing and collusion? Republicans have bailed, and Democrats can’t figure who’s in charge.

Tariffs: The executive office is vacillating due to pressure over the announced tariffs of 25% on goods from Canada and Mexico and an additional 10% on imports from China. Economists have warned these tariffs would create inflation and cut economic growth. The stock market has dropped dramatically over recent weeks due to the tariffs and the uncertainty over their implementation. But Trump denied his abrupt change had anything to do with the stock market. “I’m not even looking at the market,” Trump said, “because long term, the United States will be very strong with what’s happening.” The tariffs on allies like Canada will raise prices on energy, lumber, and cars and likely start a trade war that will hurt manufacturing and farmers.

Presidential golf costs us all: As SV Date revealed in HuffPost, in just his first month in office, Trump spent about $10.7 million in taxpayer money playing golf. Between inauguration and March 9, Trump visited Florida and his beloved golf courses six times. The Palm Beach sheriff’s office daily overtime bill alone has been reported to be $240,000. How do these costs fit in with the Orange Threat’s stated goal to cut government spending?

Economic messaging continues to plague Democrats: The Democratic divide among leaders was evident as the weekend approached. Schumer and other key Democrats voted for the Republic budget, thinking that what Musk and Trump can do with the government closed would be much worse than with the government open and under their scrutiny. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had specific criticism of the legislation itself. “This turns the federal government into a slush fund for Donald Trump and Elon Musk,” she told CNN. “It sacrifices congressional authority, and it is deeply partisan.”

Under much scrutiny right now for voting alongside Republicans to keep the federal government open, Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) explained his perspective why the shutdown of the government would just be devastating and far worse than the Republican continuing resolution.

“So their goal of decimating the whole federal government, of cutting agency after agency after agency, would occur under a shutdown. Two days from now in a shutdown, they could say, well, food stamps for kids is not essential. It’s gone. All veterans offices in rural areas are gone. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid. They’re not essential. We’re cutting them back. So it’d be horrible. The damage they can do under a shutdown is much worse than any other damage that they could do.”

Final Thoughts about Price Gouging and the Trumpsters

The boost for billionaires is expanding the national debt so that a US recession seems imminent. As Lu Yuan writes in the New York Times, many Chinese people are finding they can relate to what many Americans are going through. They feel it resembles the Cultural Revolution, the period known as “the decade of turmoil.”

Of course, the gut feeling doesn’t truly point to the way that the two countries are fundamentally different. China is a one-party state lacking in three pillars of the US system: liberty, democracy, and the rule of law. Hmmm. How strong can we say those three pillars are these days?

Featured image: “Inflation” by ccnull.de Bilddatenbank (CC BY 2.0 license).