I wouldn't fear Google imposing price increases, I would fear Google eventually jettisoning their registry business because it doesn't make Google-scale money or serve a strategic purpose.
FYI, TLDs cannot be killed off (for good reason; dropping a bunch of domain names would be harmful to the Internet). The worst that can happen is that they're transferred to another registry operator. ICANN requires daily escrow deposits as a condition of running a TLD, which allows emergency registry operators to step in and ensure TLD operation continuity if that becomes necessary.
I think that's unlikely. It can't cost them that much to run and it does serve an important strategic purpose of preventing anyone else from gaining control of a key piece of infrastructure that their whole business depends on.
I would fear Google introducing a new product or five, then sunsetting two, letting one old product hang on while they only add new functionality to another before deprecating both to resurrect an older product, then deciding they have put enough pressure on others to accomplish their goal (competition lower prices or introduces new features) so they can kill all their domain products now.
Yep that’s my fear! Oh well, nothing in life is certain.
However I am hopeful it has a strategic purpose - for anyone using Google Cloud Services, it would be more convenient to have the domain registration bundled in. Similarly, Google sell you you@yourdomain.com as an add on in Google Suites.
