McDonald's is facing a proposed nationwide class action lawsuit in federal court in Chicago alleging that its AI pricing tool lets independent franchisees exchange nonpublic price and sales data, violating antitrust laws and unfairly inflating menu prices. The suit, filed on 2 October by Illinois resident Michael Thomas, claims the company's information-sharing pricing platform draws on data from millions of daily transactions to set menu prices across thousands of US restaurants, amounting to algorithmic price-fixing. A McDonald's spokesperson called the complaint filled with inaccuracies and said the company will vigorously defend against the lawsuit, adding that AI does not set menu prices at its restaurants and that franchisees do, with optional tools that do not automate, coordinate or fix pricing. A recent Reuters investigation reported that some franchise owners were pressured to use the AI pricing tools and record deviations from their recommendations, a characterization McDonald's rejected as speculative and uninformed. According to a fact sheet the chain published in 2024, the average price of a McDonald's menu item increased about 40% between 2019 and 2024.
McDonald’s CorporationMcDonald's faces a proposed nationwide antitrust class action alleging its AI pricing tool enables franchisees to share nonpublic price/sales data and fix menu prices.
