Time To Investigate Tech Firms That Use 'AI' To Raise Rents
by Heather Vogell
ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox.
The senator tasked with overseeing federal antitrust enforcement is urging the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate whether a Texas-based company’s price-setting software is undermining competition and pushing up rents.
Amy Klobuchar, the Minnesota Democrat who chairs the Senate Subcommittee on Competition Policy, Antitrust and Consumer Rights, sent a letter to the DOJ’s Antitrust Division this month. It was also signed by two other Democrats, Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois and Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey.
“We are concerned that the use of this rate setting software essentially amounts to a cartel to artificially inflate rental rates in multifamily residential buildings,” the letter said. It encouraged the DOJ to “take appropriate action to protect renters and competition in the residential rental markets.”