Economic Policy Expert Lindsay Owens, Gouged: The End of a Fair Price

Lindsay Owens will be at the St. Louis County Library, Clark Family Branch on Tuesday, October 27, to talk about her book Gouged: The End of a Fair Price — and What That Means for Your Wallet. It's part of the library's Westfall series, and the whole thing is free and open to the public.

If you've ever walked out of a store wondering why the price on the shelf didn't match what you paid at checkout, this is exactly what Owens spends her time digging into. She's the president and CEO of Groundwork Collaborative, a Washington, D.C. economic think tank and corporate watchdog, and she's spent years as a consumer advocate. She's also a public policy expert who advises government officials and members of Congress, including a stint as a senior advisor to Senator Elizabeth Warren. In Gouged, she takes readers inside corporate boardrooms to lay out the tricks, traps, and grifts companies use to jack up prices. She argues that surveillance pricing, algorithmic price fixing, and other high-tech tactics are gutting the American economy, and the book proposes a "Shoppers' Bill of Rights" as a way to push back.

Owens isn't just writing about this from the sidelines. Under her leadership, Groundwork has driven FTC probes and forced pricing changes from companies like Google, Delta, and Instacart. She's testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee and appeared on Jon Stewart's The Weekly Show. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Rolling Stone, and she's a regular contributor to CNN, CNBC, CBS, and Bloomberg. Gouged has drawn praise from Robert B. Reich, Elizabeth Warren, and Heather McGhee.

The talk is at the Clark Family Branch, 1640 S. Lindbergh Blvd., St. Louis, MO 63131, on Tuesday, October 27, at 7 PM. Doors open at 6 PM, and since seating is limited, getting there early is a good call. It's free and open to the public.