Right so a few years's previous it was more about expanding market-share with lower prices. Then they saw employee's not getting their lives ruined when they got fired, like not getting the phone calls from that employee begging for his job back at half the wage, meaning they got told "I quit" way more, in great part because of Trump's unique $1500 check. That was what did it. Allowed a cascade of savings that freed many people. So then they could buy bulk their needs, then they could buy the toy their child truly desired as an iconic gift of their childhood and that wasn't that expensive but made them much more pleasant and resilient (this happened to me with Magic The Gathering), or like a much-needed fix for the car that was always breaking down. That shit. Bosses hate that shit. Fucking hate it, why else would they tell you it's good and not pay any raises ever if they actually wanted you to buy it? Tell you to drink tap water instead of water from bottles, when for every quart of tap water you need to drink a gallon of bottled water. Need. Not an "impulse", not a "craving", need, drinking brine makes you thirsty, it's brine, salty peanuts at the bar so you buy a "refreshing" drink. That's a confession. Advertisements say "Coca-Cola is refreshing". Confession of guilt right on the fucking billboard. Nothing can be more refreshing than pure water, or I'm sorry purified water, like Coca-Cola uses, "purified". Tap water could be purified. It never is. Bottled water is always purified, all of it, 100%. Or nobody will buy it twice! Even the bottled water that is said to come from tap water is in fact--it's true--tap water, but literally always gets filtered for fluorine, that they don't tell you. And it makes sense, refreshing, fresh, tap water, not fresh. Bottles and cans, fresh. Fresh water. Salt water. Brine. It's not relevant the percentage nobody cares, it's different all the time and if you measure it and try to tell anybody they accuse you of accusing them of conspiracy. Question is, is it salty yes or no? Yes. Is Coca-Cola refreshing? How could it be? What could you add to water to make it more refreshing than mountain streams? Literally nothing (well dextrose like I just served up, most refreshing drink bar none, but nobody sells that anywhere). You can't add anything to water to make it refreshing, you must remove something, and if there is nothing to remove, you have no business. That means you're fired. So you gotta eliminate the competition, the ultimate competition for like 20% of America's spending, some crazy amount, so put something salty in the tap water.

Saving up for the future, smart spending, man. Bosses hate that fucking shit. Prefer employees in terrible debt, behind on rent, rape extortion literally. That's the engine of the American economy, the ultimate power. Fedex's president complained about this, said when the checks went out suddenly people couldn't do backbreaking labor. Literally backbreaking now and then--Amazon was accused of this too, the reason for unionization was despite the money being good they broke backs in a week, they were squandering crazy amounts of wealth, $5000000 in treatment that doesn't even work, all to save $5 of labor costs. Bezos, the negative quadrillionaire.

So when they saw employee's not bending their backbone satisfyingly (and there's bosses who actually look out for you, not the previous two but there are, there are) they realized they would get asked for a raise. So as soon as inflation (raises) was predicted, they wanted to outdo and preempt it with higher prices. Like it was an opportunity. And in addition, as collusion, to cause the Fed to raise interest rates meaning debt becomes crazily more expensive, and really also the raising interest rates means "you can get away with anything in the workplace", it's a signal to the whole system.