> You are talking like inflation is some conspiracy wielded by “the rich” (who are they? Are they all friends with each other and plan all their schemes togethe

> You are talking like inflation is some conspiracy wielded by “the rich” (who are they? Are they all friends with each other and plan all their schemes together?) No of course not. That'd be 90s-Mr-Burns territory. Nowadays you pay a SaaS offering to do it for you if you're a landlord: https://www.propublica.org/article/yieldstar-rent-increase-realpage-rent https://www.propublica.org/article/yieldstar-rent-increase-r... So the question is -- is real estate the only market you'd do that in? Seems unlikely. "If I had to guess, I would bet that the big food conglomerates have all signed up with some common AI-backed pricing software package, and that shares data between them. Or, at the very least, they've all started using AI algorithms to increase or decrease production of any number of goods to maximize their profits based on real-time sales and economic data. And since they're all probably contracting this out to the same or a handful of similar AI firms, the conclusions they reach are similar. If all the production companies are running algorithms that tell them to jack up their prices at the same time, well they all jack up their prices at the same time. They don't actually have to meet in some smoke-filled backroom to plot a price-increase conspiracy. They just all run similar algorithms that respond the same way to market trends. The consumer market is highly consolidated, with most goods having just 1-3 producers. If those few producers all sign up for the same AI price-setting software, there won't be price competition to punish needless price increases." https://www.reddit.com/r/TrueReddit/comments/11gwm2y/european_central_bank_confronts_a_cold_reality/jarv9rg/ https://www.reddit.com/r/TrueReddit/comments/11gwm2y/europea...