As Mayor Zohran Mamdani works to make New York a city we can afford, he has an opportunity to promote higher pay and lower consumer prices by halting the rapid growth of individualized “surveillance” wage- and price-setting.

Burgeoning access to personal data is enabling corporations to exploit new technologies to low-ball pay for desperate workers and jack up prices on consumers who lack options. App-based companies such as Uber are leading the charge, and experts warn the practice is spreading, including to retailing and services where corporations are beginning to use personalized data to target prices toward individual consumers.

Senator Ruben Gallego recently introduced federal legislation to ban surveillance pricing. But efforts by states to ban these abuses have been blocked or watered down after a lobbying blitz by Big Tech. This year, New York State took a modest first step by requiring retailers to inform consumers when surveillance pricing is in effect. But disclosure alone is not enough. The new mayor and city council should build on this state law by banning these practices altogether.