ILSR has conducted a sweeping investigation that reveals Amazon has quietly become a major force in how cities, counties, and school districts purchase basic supplies — and that its tightening grip is ...

New York is facing an affordability crisis rooted in a deeper problem: too many essential systems are controlled by distant corporations. This has left residents with high grocery and energy costs, ...

Across coastal New England and NYC, 37 organizations received grants of $10,000 each to support new or existing composting projects. The Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR) is proud to announce ...

Chain dollar stores are inundating America’s communities. In both small towns and urban neighborhoods, they are edging out locally owned businesses, freezing out entrepreneurs, and shifting profits ...

Since 2000 US investment in single stream recycling collection and processing has dominated the landscape. Leading industry analysts declared, “the future of US recycling is a five letter word C H I N ...

Distributed solar, which can be owned by individuals, small businesses, and public entities, is turning the electricity industry upside down as individuals choose to generate their own solar power on ...

One of the most striking measures of Amazon’s monopoly power is the extraordinary amount of money that it’s able to extract from the independent businesses that rely on its site to reach customers. In ...

AI technology and large language models are growing in popularity. Also growing is the technology’s detrimental effect on the environment. Each query into ChatGPT, to use one example, requires ...

Big Waste dominates every aspect of solid waste and recycling practice and policy. The top four consolidated companies earn $30 billion of the $70 billion economic sector. Big Waste companies own or ...

Dollar General, Dollar Tree, and Family Dollar are targeting vulnerable communities, opening stores at a breakneck pace in urban and rural areas alike. It’s tempting to assume that these chains simply ...

ILSR’s new report, Upcharge: Hidden Costs of Electric Utility Monopoly Power, is a deep dive into the problems associated with the 100-year-old model granting private companies exclusive power over ...

Composting cuts greenhouse gas emissions, enhances the ability of soil to act as a carbon sink, and builds community resilience to climate disruptions. Use our new graphic to share these benefits! It ...