Democrats must return to their pro-labor roots, starting with the grocery store

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The 43,000 residents of Woonsocket, R.I., never need wonder where to buy their groceries; thanks to a legal power play by the community’s only grocery store, the entire town is limited to just a single option. Since the majority of Woonsocket’s residents lack easy access to transportation, most found themselves living in what the U.S. Department of Agriculture classifies as a “food desert.“

At least, that was the case until Lt. Gov. Sabina Matos championed a bill to end the abuse of restrictive covenants responsible for creating monopolistic food deserts across her state.

But restrictive covenants are just one part of the problem. Across the nation, food suppliers and major grocery chains are flouting a federal law meant to prevent price-fixing and anticompetitive practices. Meanwhile, a surge of special interest money from major grocery and retailer lobby groups has purchased the silence of both Democratic and Republican lawmakers.

Democrats talk a big game about being pro-labor, yet it’s almost impossible to get them to talk about the Robinson-Patman Act, a 1936 antitrust law that bars wholesalers from engaging in price discrimination when selling to different buyers. They’ve been equally silent on years of mass consolidation among the industry’s top grocery chains despite those mergers devastating store workers’ wages and raising prices for consumers.

And these are the people who are supposed to be pro-labor!

Last May, the Federal Trade Commission quietly dismissed a lawsuit that alleged PepsiCo had illegally offered grocery titan Walmart illegal pricing discounts while charging smaller independent and chain stores more for the same product. The decision barely made a ripple in Democratic circles, despite hand-wringing from the Democratic National Committee about how the party can win back the trust and support of a labor movement fractured by Trump’s appeals to protectionist trade policies. Compelling megacorporations to follow the law would be a good start.

The problems in the grocery industry stretch far beyond the routine flouting of the Robinson-Patman Act. For years, grocery store workers have suffered wage declines and job losses while congressional Democrats have ignored the problem, and Republicans have actively worsened it. Wages have fallen so much that about 12 percent of grocery store workers now suffer from intermittent homelessness, according to Faye Guenther, the president of United Food and Commercial Workers International Union Local 3000.

“Grocery store workers were called heroes during the pandemic, and some of them got $2 an hour average wage increases, but those were later scraped back as store chains merged,” Guenther told me. “Inflation has hurt low-wage workers the most, because even lower-cost store brands are increasing in price. Workers work around food all day long and can barely afford to buy it.”

Grocery store worker wages have fallen 15 percent in real terms over the last two decades. Part of that loss is inflation-driven, but a larger portion is the result of a move toward staff reduction through the use of new technologies, including artificial intelligence. At the same time, grocery chains are consolidating at the fastest rate in nearly 50 years, juicing profits for mega-chains while forcing independent competitors to either merge or shutter.

The results speak for themselves. Despite young Americans facing the worst summer job market in nearly a century, driven by a steep decline in hiring at grocery stores, the largest American grocery store chains are posting record profits and revenue growth. The grocery sector as a whole has averaged roughly 2 percent revenue growth annually; massive chains like Walmart are growing nearly three times as fast.

Matos and other state leaders are making admirable progress in rebalancing the lopsided relationship between grocery store chain management and the labor they exploit. Rhode Island recently became the first state to limit the use of self-checkout stations and end the use of restrictive covenants. But a nationwide crisis requires federal leadership, and silent Democrats are missing the opportunity to lead on an issue that could mobilize a new coalition of voters in 2026 and 2028.

Enforcing the Robinson-Patman Act is a starting point. Passing the long-stalled PRO Act is an even better idea. Former President Joe Biden failed to bring it to a vote during his time in office, a major contributing factor in labor’s shift away from Democrats in 2024. Punting on the PRO Act was moral and political malpractice. Democrats must correct course and rediscover the importance of fighting for America’s struggling working people.

For a Democratic Party that has grown so alienated from its labor roots, the link between thriving workers and a thriving democracy is the most important story that the growing field of 2028 presidential hopefuls can tell.

“If anybody cares about protecting the future of democracy and making sure that we share power in a way that’s good for workers, consumers, and businesses, including small businesses, people need to focus on making sure Democrats actually enact pro-labor policies,” Guenther says. “Otherwise we’re just going to keep repeating this same cycle.”

Max Burns is a veteran Democratic strategist and founder of Third Degree Strategies.

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