When I go to the [BLEEP] supermarket, like I went to the supermarket,
I'm seeing that everything tripled up.
That lettuce was $2 a couple of months ago and
not it's [BLEEP] seven, of course I'm gonna say something.
The [BLEEP], cuz if I think that is crazy, I can only imagine what middle class
people or people in the hood is mother [BLEEP] thinking.
So yes, I'm going to say something, the [BLEEP], and I have a big platform, so
I do want anybody that's responsible of these [BLEEP] prices to put that [BLEEP]
the [BLEEP] down.
>> That's Cardi B, just as tired of the new hiked up grocery prices as we are.
And she made it clear not just in that pretty awesome rant, but
in a thread of now viral tweets.
Here's one, Cardi tweets, nah,
grocery shopping prices are ridiculous right now, you might as well eat outside.
I'm not sure I follow the logic on it, but I do like the anger with it.
Another tweet, she complained about the price of lettuce being $6 where she lives.
While many on Twitter ridiculed the rich rapper for lamenting grocery prices,
others argued in favor of her showing empathy.
This is a problem affecting a lot of Americans.
What do y'all think?
>> I love it >> I'm a supporter.
>> I'm here for Cardi B.
She has always been a person of the people,
I can't believe she actually goes to the grocery store by herself.
If I was at Sprouts and I saw Cardi B, I'd be like, my God,
you're Cardi B, what are you doing here?
>> For the record, I don't think she often does.
She said she has someone that does most of the shopping.
She gets a weekly price report, cost report and then occasionally she maybe
once a year pops into the store like a president does just to seem relatable.
>> I'm so glad that somebody is talking about it.
It's crazy.
And I absolutely 100% agree with her.
I feel like we're amongst the lucky ones that can afford these higher prices.
I live in a low income neighborhood.
I live in South Central LA, and
I don't know how some of these people are affording lettuce and really basic goods.
Bread, peanut butter, cheese, everything has skyrocketed, and
hey, our wages have not skyrocketed.
Nobody's wages are going up commensurate to what it costs to buy any things like
basic, basic goods.
We used to make fun of how you would go to Whole Foods,
we'd call it whole paycheck, right?
And you'd buy six things and it'd be $100.
That's everywhere now.
That's every single grocery store, you buy six things and it's $100.
How are people surviving?
I don't understand.
>> They need to open a store called Part Foods.
>> [LAUGH] >> You just get a little sliver of
the food.
>> One slice of cheese.
>> That's what we're gonna be down to soon.
So, all right, look,
I'm gonna back up what you're saying with numbers in terms of inflation.
And by the way, they blame it on you guys cuz your wages are too high.
Nonsense, total utter nonsense.
I'm gonna show it to you in the numbers in a minute.
But first, I agree with you guys, they're like, it's so
hypocritical of Cardi B to be rich, but then to care about poor people.
>> [LAUGH] >> Why is that hypocritical?
That's not hypocritical at all.
This is a weirdo thing that people say either out of envy or
because they're right wingers and they're like, don't help anybody,
don't care about the poor, don't care about the middle class.
No, it's wonderful if she got rich and famous and
she still cares about the poor and the middle class.
That's not a bad thing, it's a great thing.
And I don't you understand the word hypocrisy, [LAUGH] right?
It's a thousand times worse when someone gets rich, Dave Chappelle, and
then is like, screw the poor, who cares about the poor.
[LAUGH] Yeah, I make fun of them, I'm so courageous, okay.
Yeah, that's my views on Chappelle, but also every Republican on the planet.
And it's not like she's pulling a Dr.
Oz and she's like, I do declare the price of crude today is through the roof.
>> Yeah, and they're like, bro there's cheaper lettuce and carrots right here.
>> Yeah, so, no, she's still complaining about the price of the veggie tray,
[LAUGH] not the crudites.
So, I can't even see what she did wrong.
[LAUGH] I don't know why everybody, I think that there's this,
seriously, this idea that if you're wealthy,
in order to do good, you have to give up all of your money at once.
No, you could keep some of your money and live nice and still help people.
So thank God for Cardi B.
>> Agreed, and
here are some of the numbers that Cenk said we were gonna bring to you right now.
While overall inflation has risen just 7.1%,
which is not a just, that's a huge number already,
groceries hit a staggering 12% increase as of November 2022.
Eggs which have suffered shortages due to avian flu have seen a nearly 50%
increase in price.
Those who receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or
SNAP allotments have been hit particularly hard.
Even with increases in allotment,
SNAP recipients often have trouble affording groceries as rising assistance
does not match the rates at which grocery prices are going up.
In short, the struggle is real.
So, why is this happening, we have to ask?
Well, surprise, surprise,
the underlying economic problem is profit-price inflation.
It's caused by corporations raising their prices above their increasing costs.
Corporations are using those increasing costs of materials, components and
labor as excuses to increase their prices even higher, resulting in bigger profits.
This is why corporate profits are close to levels not seen in over
half a century, as Robert Reich spoke about in the Guardian.
But, Ben, tell me more about groceries.
Sure, no problem.
>> [LAUGH] >> Why are the groceries prices through
the roof?
Because just four companies control 85% of meat and poultry processing.
Just one corporation sets the price for most of the nation's seed corn and
two giant firms dominate consumer staples.
All are raising prices and increasing profits just because they can.
What's even more shameful is CEOs are openly admitting this,
openly admitting it.
I don't even know if it's more shameful, at least it's a little bit of honesty.
But so transparently seeing their greed in action,
admitting they're raising prices to increase profits amid inflation.
Quote, we're feeling good about how our consumers are staying
loyal to our brands in spite of some of our pricing decisions,
says Ramon Laguarta, the CEO of PepsiCO.
Or the CFO of Procter & Gamble saying,
while it's too soon to declare success, given the strength of our portfolio,
broad-based share gains and early in-market results,
we feel relatively well positioned about our position to execute pricing.
>> We've now read about half a dozen of those quotes to you guys in different
shows because if you go to their earnings calls,
that's where the CEOs brag about how well they did to the market.
And so they tell the market, we're increasing prices like crazy and
these suckers are still paying it.
And so our profit margins are through the roof.
Now, I'm gonna show you that that is the case in the numbers.
See in a normal market as prices increase,
it's because firms have three different components to a price,
your labor costs, your non-labor costs and your profit margin, right?
Now, normally every year you give a little bit of a raise to labor, so
labor winds up becoming a bigger part of the increase in your prices.
So from 1979 to 2019, 60% of the increase prices was due to labor.
Now, that's a long stretch of time, but it makes sense.
It doesn't mean your wages went up a lot, they didn't.
But of the same prices that went up, and if inflation was relatively under control,
60% of it was due to labor, and that is normal, okay?
And only 11% were extra profits that they were piling on.
But since 2019, after COVID hit, they realized, my God,
there's no one checking at all.
We're all monopolized now over all of these years.
We've gained control of these markets.
We get to set almost any price we want, and
the government isn't regulating us anymore.
They'll let us do anything.
They'll let us strand millions of people in airports,
screw over the entire Christmas breaks, etc.
[LAUGH] And they won't fine us $1, even the Democrats won't do it,
they're a goddamn joke.
They're almost bragging about it in these calls.
So what happened?
In these last three years, only 8% of the price increases have been
due to labor, 54% were because of extra profits.
So when you see on cable news, whether it's Fox News or MSNBC, telling you, and
they both have and we showed those clips to you as well,
inflation's because of the workers, the wages are going up too much.
And by the way, the Federal Reserve representing the rich and the powerful,
we got to raise interest rates so that we lower employment and lower wages, and
that's going to give us stability.
It doesn't have anything to do with wages.
It's all the massive profit that they're taking home.
>> And a big part of the 8% isn't even increased wages.
It's because unemployment has been so low, they have to just pay more people,
not paying them better rates.
>> Yeah, so that's another part of it.
So, and you never hear this in corporate media, why?
Cuz they're also giant corporations, [LAUGH] right, so
they're not gonna tell you, we're also taking home the profit and
we're all pretending that it's your fault, when it's [LAUGH] actually our decisions.
So that's why Cardi B,
greater than all of corporate media in telling you the truth about prices.
>> Amen, and it's one thing to gouge people on a Tesla, but
to gouge people on eggs and bread and peanut butter,
these corporations are truly evil at this point.
The whole thing that happened with the infant formula, what is happening?
These are basic necessities.
Eggs, you're gonna fleece the American public on eggs?
Go suck an egg.
>> I hope we call this story Cardi B mad about price gouging.
>> [LAUGH] >> That's my wish-
>> It took me a second, but I got it.
>> For the Christmas season.