In the News

Press Release

The Grinch in the Gift Aisle: Holiday Gifts Prices Up 26% This Year, Report Finds

New analysis from Groundwork Collaborative, The Century Foundation, and AFT finds that prices on many of this season’s most popular holiday gifts are climbing faster than Santa up the chimney, with prices rising an average of 26% since last year — nearly nine times overall inflation.

December 9, 2025 Groundwork Collaborative

Press Release

New Report Exposes Instacart’s Hidden Price Games

A new investigation from Groundwork Collaborative, Consumer Reports, and More Perfect Union reveals that Instacart, enabled by the artificial intelligence pricing software Eversight, is running large-scale, hidden price experiments on unsuspecting customers.

December 9, 2025 Groundwork Collaborative

Press Release

Consumers Feeling Less Than Jolly, Pulling Back on Holiday Shopping as Prices Rise and Confidence Plummets

This year, Black Friday put many shoppers in the red.

December 5, 2025 Groundwork Collaborative

Mention

Is using a “buy now, pay later” service a good idea?

I think this is indicative of a really stressed American consumer. They are ultimately trying to grapple with higher prices as we head into the holiday season either to afford Thanksgiving dinner, Christmas gifts under the tree or just trying to make sure that they can make rent."

December 4, 2025 WUSA9

Press Release

Fed’s Beige Book Reveals Weakening Spending, Rising Hardship, and Shutdown-Driven Strain

Last week, the Federal Reserve released the November 2025 'Beige Book’ which gives an up-to-date look at the economy — including jobs, consumer spending, and inflation — across all 12 Federal Reserve Districts.

December 3, 2025 Groundwork Collaborative

Mention

Prices in the Machine

“I think it’s possible that this is headed back to cost-based pricing,” said Owens, whose book Gouged about the new era of pricing releases next year. “It’s the way companies priced for decades … There is a world where the outcome is transparent, public, predictable pricing.”

December 2, 2025 The American Prospect

Mention

Selling the Poor on Spending Like They’re Rich

Those of us who are “too poor to afford life, but too high-income to get help,” as Elizabeth Pancotti put it, “are caught between a plutonomy that pushes prices higher and a lower class that, under the Trump administration, is rapidly having the social safety net pulled out from under them."

December 1, 2025 The American Prospect

Mention

America faces an affordability crisis. Here’s how 27 experts say they’d fix it

“I think what this conversation tends to miss is that people are upset about prices right now and the immediate relief from the price level is critical for addressing affordability in people’s minds. And so what I would say, which is kind of taboo in economic circles, is pairing these large supply increases with targeted short-term price regulations in healthcare, housing and in energy.”

December 1, 2025 CNN

Mention

Why you may not want lower prices as much as you think you do

“You won’t see us calling for deflation. If we’re in a position where we start to see deflation, it’s because things are going seriously, seriously, seriously wrong [and] people are really, really broke,” said Lindsay Owens, who runs the liberal group Groundwork Collaborative.

November 30, 2025 The Washington Post

Mention

Trump Devours Thanksgiving Budgets; Major Special Election In Tennessee w/ Liz Pancotti

“Unfortunately, we find that 65% of Americans are stressed about affording Thanksgiving this year. That stretches across party lines. We find that it’s 72% for Democrats and 59% for Republicans.”

November 26, 2025 Majority Report