X-users criticized a recent Axios article with a “Community Notes” fact check this week after the outlet rejected the notion that Vice President Kamala Harris’s “price gouging” policy proposal amounts to price controls.
Readers of the social media platform pointed out that many other Axios articles (including one by the same author defending the Democratic presidential candidate's new proposals) called similar policies in other countries “price controls.”
“The same author called it 'price controls' when the UK proposed voluntary limits on grocery store profits,” part of the Community X Note on Tuesday stated.
Harris announced last week that as president she would institute a “federal ban on food and grocery price gouging” to prevent “large corporations” from taking advantage of consumers.
ECONOMIC COMMENTARY WARNS THAT HARRIS’ PRICE CONTROL PLAN HAS ALREADY BEEN TESTED IN “VENEZUELA, ARGENTINA AND THE SOVIET UNION”
Critics and several media outlets have slammed Vice President Kamala Harris's price control policy proposal. (Montinique Monroe/Getty Images)
The headline of Axios reporter Emily Peck's article — as it appeared on X — read: “Don't Call It Price Controls: How Price-Gouging Bans Actually Work.”
While denying that Harris's policy proposal is “Soviet-style price controls,” Peck defended it by saying it is in line with existing U.S. laws.
“If banning price gouging is communist, then America became Marxist a long time ago. Most of us live in states that already have bans in place,” Peck wrote, though, as noted in his article, these laws only “prohibit businesses from raising prices during emergencies.”
Peck then assumed that Harris's policy would only be implemented in an emergency, writing: “If a national ban on price gouging is structured like these local bans, triggered only in emergencies and targeted at specific firms, it is not clear that it would have much of an impact.”
DAVE RAMSEY EXPLAINS WHY KAMALA HARRIS' PRICE CONTROL PLAN WILL NOT STOP INFLATION: “IT IS NOT SUSTAINABLE”
US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris speaks at a campaign rally in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S., August 20, 2024. (Reuters/Kevin Lamarque)
X users harshly criticized Peck's headline and activated the platform's “Community Notes” feature to alert about the author's allegedly inconsistent reporting on similar price control proposals.
The note provided a link to Peck's 2023 article that mentioned similar policies in UK price controls.
At the time, he wrote: “The UK is considering voluntary price controls on essential foodstuffs as the country grapples with sky-high supermarket inflation. Why it matters: Persistent inflation is changing the debate over price controls. Once seen as an affront to capitalism, they are starting to look more appealing, especially to politicians who want to avoid headlines about people who can't afford to eat.”
The other part of the fact check said: “Axios called it 'price controls' when it proposed limiting how much Russia could profit from oil in times of crisis.”
He provided a link to that 2022 article by Axios reporter Matt Phillips that said, “Price controls were largely abandoned after the 1970s as U.S. and global politics shifted toward less government involvement in the economy.”
Phillips added: “On Friday, finance ministers from the G-7 group of major economies pledged to implement a plan aimed at limiting the amount of money Russia makes from oil sales, effectively forming a cartel of buyers to try to cap Russian crude prices.”
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Axios did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.
