There has never been any tenable proof of how well government has actually performed its bounden duty to control the prices of “key, basic, or essential commodities” that most consumers buy. Yet, it has officially announced it was adopting “shrinkflation,” or allowing manufacturers to “downsize their products but keeping the same price as before.” In lieu of raising prices, manufacturing companies may reduce the contents or sizes of the basic items, by how much is anyone’s guess.

Altruistically, this should never be a policy choice of government — that which is better left to market forces in laissez faire. At the heart of it, this strategy may have long been practiced by manufacturers who, if they cannot raise prices against their rivals, would derive profits in some other sneaky way.

Economists mistakenly theorize that consumers are only price-averse and if the contents of the product they bought are actually less than they paid for, just indifferent.

As government continues to exhibit a behavior pattern favoring private business at every turn, keen observers might see a case of regulatory capture, thereby rendering professed advocacy as mere lip service.

Why should an individual pay more for less product? On what moral high ground can the regulator even justify that shrinkflation is permitted because manufacturers import their raw materials vis-à-vis “disruptions” in the global value chain?

There’s no hard support for consumers’ willingness to pay the “price as before” for a product reduced in quantity or quality due to input costs on the part of the manufacturer. How true is the claim that consumer preference is for product size reduction ather than a price increase? Truth be told, consumers have been duped on both counts, viz: 1) prices of goods have incredibly increased and 2) some “grocery store basics” had already shrunk — long before the trade and industry department gave the green light to shrinkflation.

It’s unfortunate government takes affirmative action for companies to become “shrink-inflators” while putting consumers at the mercy of rapacious capitalists. If one game theory like “Prisoner’s Dilemma” plays out, businesses attaining their bottom lines wouldn’t be few and far between; the consuming public become the “silent losers.”

It’s important to ask if this form of “economic subterfuge” is temporary or would it be the new normal?

If shrinkflation incentivizes the capitalist’s greed to not simply survive on a stable profit base but “squeeze more bang out of every buck,” then we have a problem. Like a double-bladed sword, what might shrink is not just the quantity but more so the quality of a product.

How is shrinkflation to be applied to all other product lines when no one knows how long this “consumer nightmare” will last?

If inflation soon dies, will there be a corresponding drop in prices? Will government require companies to put shrinkflation labels products to warn shoppers? After its “unholy” announcement, DTI has yet to issue both a grocery list and a price guide for shrunken products that clueless consumers would be buying.

Why does government always side with the private companies at the expense of a captive population of consumers who seem defenseless against a business strategy totally unfavorable to them, and to think that basic commodities are fast-moving items in groceries and supermarkets?

Jarod Kintz had said, “Shrinkflation is when you pay more money and receive less than what you used to get at a lower price. It’s like buying a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and being served two pieces of bread.”

Back off, shrinking!