Sure, but they weren't able to execute on that greed to the same extent that they were in 2017. Look at the profits of big tech in 2021 compared to 2017. In a well-functioning free market, most of the surplus is captured by the consumer rather than the producer. So excess profits are a sign of an inefficient market, and thus the drum beat for anti-trust enforcement against Google/Apple/Amazon/Facebook.
Neither Google nor Facebook make any significant profit from selling consumer profits. It's pretty tenuous to claim that their large profits are driving consumer inflation. Amazon makes virtually zero profits in consumer goods. It's high recent profits come from the B2B segments of AWS and advertising. Apple's margins have always been historically high. If anything iPhone concentration in the smartphones has declined since 2017.
The sizable bulk of consumer inflation is being driven by housing, energy, food and used cars. It's extremely tenuous to tie any of this to FAANG profits.
