Sen. Elizabeth Warren and 15 other Democratic lawmakers are renewing a call for an investigation this week into whether “tariff enabled price-gouging” is set to impact consumers in the years ahead as President Trump’s trade moves continue to ripple through the US economy.
This week’s call came in a new letter, shared first with Yahoo Finance, where Warren and her colleagues are asking the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to look into what they say is growing evidence that “hypothetical warnings about the potential for price gouging are now manifesting themselves in price increases at consumers’ expense.”
The evidence which the Democrats acknowledge remains anecdotal at this point centers around a recent survey from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. That report raised concerns of companies “taking advantage of an escalating pricing environment” amid a larger portrait of businesses trying to grapple with their options about how and whether to pass along current and possible future tariff costs.
Senator Elizabeth Warren is seen at the U.S. Capitol in June. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images) · Tom Williams via Getty Images
The letter also underscores the political saliency of any and all consumer effects from Trump’s trade plans, with Trump himself highly engaged on the issue and his White House often dismissing fears from both Democrats and independent economists that his trade moves will have an impact on prices.
Foreign nations and companies should “eat the tariffs” Trump often says. A new report this month from his Council of Economic Advisers found that prices of imported goods have actually fallen this year with faster declines than overall goods prices.
This week’s letter is the second from Warren and her colleagues after a May letter raised concerns about price gouging possibilities. That message was one the Democrats say Trump’s team didn’t respond to.
This week’s follow-up calls on Andrew Ferguson, the Trump appointed chair of the FTC, to investigate whether “some large companies are taking advantage of President Trump’s chaotic tariff strategy to price gouge consumers.”
The evidence they cite for their concerns is a recent survey from the New York Fed that took a look at how companies and tariff costs and did find that — in addition to businesses passing on many actual tariff costs to consumers — “a significant share of businesses also reported raising the selling prices of their goods and services unaffected by tariffs.”
The report acknowledges that other factors like rising wages and insurance costs play a role but maintains “it is possible that in some cases, businesses were taking advantage of an escalating pricing environment to increase prices.”
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