Socialist Policies Tackle Pasta Inflation

Italian consumer rights group, Assoutenti, has called for a consumer "pasta strike" for fifteen days, blaming corporate profiteering for the surge in pasta prices, despite wheat prices being down significantly. This echoes a successful effort in 1914 by the Providence, Rhode Island Italian Socialist Club to resist price gouging by the "Macaroni King" Frank Ventrone. The lesson is that prices and inflation are not mechanical forces of nature, but always the outcome of multiple social forces, and that collective bargaining through a socialist organization tempered the monopoly power of a local retailer, bringing prices closer to the "competitive price."