Tag: Congress

Heard of the Robinson-Patman Act? If you spend money, you should.

Small retailers have a law to help them compete but is little used.

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Have you noticed a considerable decline in local and regional retail businesses over the years?

Small groceries, pharmacies, hardware, music shops, bookstores have lost out to what we now call “Big Box”.

Some of this can be contributed to changing shopping tastes.  Big Box can offer the stock and breadth of products that smaller retailers cannot.  I admit that I go to Big Box for this reason.  Also, Big Box has a stronger online presence that some retail businesses have either not adapted well to or refuse to. 

Robinson-Patman Act

Local and regional retailers do have the support of the Robinson-Patman Act.  It was enacted in 1936 by Senator Joseph T. Robinson of Arkansas and Representative Wright Patman of Texas.  The Act was designed to restrict price discrimination by large suppliers and protect small retailers from national chain stores.  Suppliers could offer discounts to retailers who bought in bulk, but criteria had to be available to any retailer, without favoritism to individual ones.

The 1980’s saw enforcement begin to wane, as challenges to price discrimination began being seen as anti-competitive.  Businesses were allowed to violate either the law or the spirit of the law and get away with it.

Walmart and Pepsi Collusion

In late 2025 The Institute of Local Self Reliance sued the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to make public censored details from the case involving PepsiCo and Walmart.  Brought by three Walmart customers, the suit alleged that PepsiCo was informing Walmart what other retailers were paying for the product and conspiring with Walmart’s knowledge to charge them a lower price, in keeping with Walmart’s well-known message of having lower prices.  The Trump Administration subsequently supported the decision by the current FTC to not pursue it any further.

Legislation

On March 19, 2026, Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut filed in Congress the Fair Prices for Local Businesses Act.  In effect it would strengthen the Robinson-Patman act by eliminating loopholes that currently allow large companies from striking better deals with suppliers than their smaller rivals.  In other words, it would further codify as illegal the arrangement that occurred between Walmart and PepsiCo. 

Conclusion

One thing I advocate is strengthening anti-trust laws to allow for a greater definition of what anti-trust and anti-monopoly behavior is.  This can allow judges have better clarity as to what is in violation and what isn’t.  I support this law.  Equally important, it should go further and eliminate bulk discounts to large retailers.  Testimony from local and regional retailers on this would be welcome, and the media picks up on it as a priority. 

Contact your Senators and ask them to support this legislation.  At the same time ask them to support the Break Up Big Medicine Act, a bi-partisan legislation by Senators Hawley and Warren.  This targets Big Pharma and its acquisitions of health care companies and pharmacies.

 

 

Budget Deficit:  How Big Tech Can Help

Make Big Tech Help Fund the Three Percent Solution

Andrew Ross Sorkin of the New York Times in a recent DealBook post recently highlighted activity by Ray Dalio.  He reports Mr. Dalio, Chief Investment Officer of Bridgewater Associates, has been making the rounds in Washington talking about the budget deficit.

RAY DALIO

Dalio has been discussing what he calls the “Three Percent Solution.”  Simply put, the goal is to reduce the deficit to Gross Domestic Product (GPR) ratio to 3%.  This can be done by 1) cutting spending, 2) raising tax revenue and 3) lowering interest rates.

Sorkin adds, “A fiscally responsible budget would ease volatility in the bond market. Any economic slowdown caused by reduced spending could be offset by lower interest rates, which is what a heavily indebted nation needs most.”

He follows by saying “All three levers need to work in tandem.”

ANALYSIS

In my opinion, the three percent solution idea makes sense.

Spending by Congress is something I cannot control, nor do I have any quick fix ways to do this.

SOLUTION

There is an idea to raise revenue: place an acquisition tax on the Big Tech firms (Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, Facebook) for every company they have acquired. 

Since they have all have over 80 acquisitions each, why not tax them on it, per acquisition, and make them pay for creating this situation.  Make it an annual tax so they would pay it every year. 

Big Tech seems to be averse to paying fines, both here in the United States and in Europe.  They seem to complain more about being broken up.  Well, if federal efforts at breaking them up do not work, why not at least profit from the status quo?

It would then need to be determined how much per acquisition they would have to pay.  It could also be applied to companies in other industries such as Big Pharma.  It would be based on the number of acquisitions made at the current moment.  It could also apply to future acquisitions.  It could also be graded, such as paying a higher rate the larger number of acquisitions or the price.  The more the merrier.

Such a tax, no matter how widespread, is not a “solution” to the deficit problem.  But it would be additional source of revenue.  Yes it is a tax increase.  However, it is not an income tax increase to the average citizen. 

But what about if Big Tech threatens to raise prices to offset this tax?  Well, to paraphrase President Trump:

“Make them eat it.”