Washington, D.C. — Corporations are using mass surveillance and hidden algorithms to illegally inflate prices for consumers and suppress wages for workers, a new report from anti-monopoly, tech policy, workplace justice, and consumer rights advocates reveals. Authored by experts at the American Economic Liberties Project, Towards Justice, National Employment Law Project, AI Now Institute, Consumer Reports and others, the report, “Prohibiting Surveillance Prices and Wages”, calls on state lawmakers and enforcers across the country to ban discriminatory surveillance price- and wage-setting, and to leverage existing laws to rein in illegal conduct.

“Surveillance pricing is fueling America’s affordability crisis, allowing corporations to charge people the highest price they can tolerate while paying them the lowest wage they will accept,” said Lee Hepner, Senior Legal Counsel at American Economic Liberties Project and one of the authors of the report. “The mass exploitation of sensitive data to maximize prices while minimizing wages is a threat to the financial independence of all Americans. Our findings show that this threat is not hypothetical – but it’s not inevitable either. Public officials have an imperative to correct the potentially catastrophic power imbalances that these technologies create.”

“We’re thrilled to see that state lawmakers are already starting to act, but there’s more work to be done,” said Pat Garofalo, Director of State and Local Policy at the American Economic Liberties Project. “As millions of Americans continue to get swindled via hidden algorithms, it’s time for policymakers to pass flat out bans on surveillance-driven price and wage discrimination.”

Over the past few weeks, lawmakers in multiple states, in coordination with experts at Economic Liberties, have introduced bills prohibiting the practice, including in California, Illinois, Colorado, and Georgia. The release of the report comes as California State Assemblymember Chris Ward (D-San Diego) introduces AB 446 at a press conference in Sacramento, CA today — which will feature Economic Liberties’ Lee Hepner. The bill would prohibit corporations from setting prices based on a consumer’s personal information, including financial data, browser history, or other protected class.

The report released today details how companies are leveraging invasive data collection—including financial vulnerability, shopping history, and even biometric data—to determine pricing and wages on an individual level. Examples include retailers charging higher prices to certain consumers based on their location or purchase patterns, ride-share companies adjusting fares based on phone battery levels, and gig platforms paying workers less if data suggests they are financially desperate.

Despite the clear harms, corporations operate these pricing and wage-setting systems in secret, making it difficult for consumers and workers to recognize when they are being exploited. While some existing laws can be used to challenge surveillance pricing, the report calls for urgent state-level action to explicitly prohibit these tactics. It urges policymakers to enact clear bans on individualized surveillance-driven pricing and wage setting, ensuring that all consumers and workers are treated fairly in the marketplace.

Read the full report, “Prohibiting Surveillance Prices and Wages” here.

Learn more about Economic Liberties here.

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The American Economic Liberties Project works to ensure America’s system of commerce is structured to advance, rather than undermine, economic liberty, fair commerce, and a secure, inclusive democracy. Economic Liberties believes true economic liberty means entrepreneurs and businesses large and small succeed on the merits of their ideas and hard work; commerce empowers consumers, workers, farmers, and engineers instead of subjecting them to discrimination and abuse from financiers and monopolists; foreign trade arrangements support domestic security and democracy; and wealth is broadly distributed to support equitable political power.