It’s absolutely sickening to officially learn that at least one major supermarket chain and it’s stores under other names jacked up prices of two of the most widely purchased items.

We have all been complaining the price of milk and eggs since the pandemic. We never want to believe price gouging is happening but we know that not only does our gut tell us something is going on, economists have been talking about it since the pandemic.

Now the proof is officially here, at least with one major supermarket chain.

I can only imagine other grocery store chains are being looked at, too, although this proof literally comes from the horses mouth and what a gut punch to know that so many consumers were taken advantage of.

According to the Common Dreams website, it all went down during a Federal Trade Commission investigation with Andy Groff, Kroger’s senior director for pricing.

Why did it all come out? Because Kroger is trying to buy Albertson’s.

The grocery chain raised its egg and milk prices above the rate of inflation, a concession that came as no surprise to economists who have been highlighting corporate price gouging across the U.S. economy in recent years.

Of course to no one’s surprise, according to Bloomberg, a spokesperson for Kroger said that admission was “cherry-picked” and “does not reflect Kroger’s decades-long business model to lower prices for customers by reducing its margins.”

Chief economist with Groundwork Collaborative posted as well saying this was never a secret, there’s just now an admission.

According to the Raw Story website, the grocery industry as a whole represented by four of its largest players became more profitable during the pandemic it’s still happening.

Kroger blankets much of the country with just these 17 states without a Kroger or related grocery store: Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont, Maryland, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Hawaii.