Posted on 01/20/2023 10:13:16 PM PST by blueplum
The price of eggs has skyrocketed in recent months, up 138% year-over-year last month. A dozen eggs now averages about $4.25, due in part to avian flu, which is tearing through poultry farms across the U.S.—wiping out some 58 million birds in the last year.
But there’s another culprit, says a farm advocacy group: price gouging. America’s largest egg producer saw a 600% jump in profits in the last quarter...
...“Avian flu is not manufactured—it’s real,” says Joe Maxwell, the co-founder of Farm Action. “But the dominant firms are using that supply chain disruption to gouge the consumers...”
...Overall, U.S. egg inventory was down 29% in December compared to the beginning of the year, largely because the dominant egg producers chose not to increase production despite “favorable conditions,” says Basel Musharbash, a lawyer for Farm Action.
“.... it does suggest that there is something worth investigating here and looking into how the industry seemed to calibrate its production decisions across competitors in order to induce and maintain these extremely high prices ...
(Excerpt) Read more at time.com ...
Eggs in So-Cal are $8.99 for an 18=pk at the supermarket. Costco 24pk eggs are $6.59 and sell out before noon
This is how Stalin took over. He blamed the producers, shot them and nationalized the industry.
Fact is, egg farmers are pinched between cost of production and payment.
My neighbor Connie used to gather up the eggs her father’s 10,000 chickens laid.
She said avian flu could devastate an operation.
“In 2016, worldwide, almost 66 billion chickens were produced.”
https://carnegiemnh.org/counting-your-chickens-the-worlds-most-numerous-bird/
“the global tally is up from only 7.5 billion chickens 55 years earlier.”
That’s a lot of egg gathering!
I bought my favorite organic pasture-raised eggs from a producer in my state today at Natural Grocer. $3.99 per dozen, gorgeous large brown eggs from Wilcox Family Farms.
. If you have a Natural Grocer close to you, they always have some outstanding deals on very high quality eggs. . Last month, before bird flu, they’d often be on sale for $1.99.
Natural Grocer also have extremely expensive things too, always top quality. Plus every supplement known to man, aisles of them.
I bought my favorite organic pasture-raised eggs from a producer in my state today at Natural Grocer. $3.99 per dozen, gorgeous large brown eggs from Wilcox Family Farms.
. If you have a Natural Grocer close to you, they always have some outstanding deals on very high quality eggs. . Last month, before bird flu, they’d often be on sale for $1.99.
Natural Grocer also have extremely expensive things too, always top quality. Plus every supplement known to man, aisles of them.
My eggs haven’t had a price raise. I only buy the pastured eggs because the nutrition of eggs from healthy chickens is far superior. I always paid $6-7 a dozen and I buy a few dozen a week. You should buy animal foods from the healthiest animals you can afford.
looks like no Calif locations for Natural Grocers, closest being AZ. Thanks for the heads up tho :)
BTTT!!!
she's finally getting some routine customers now that the chicks are laying again....farm raised fresh eggs for $5 dozen seems like a bargain to me seeing as how Costco was completely out of them the other day and some stores are charging well over that if they have them....
yet one person on the phone told her she was "gouging"....
In 1950 a dozen eggs cost sixty cents.
That is $7.29 in today’s money.
There is no such thing as price gouging. So STFU! Supply and demand. That’s it
Nice historical reference and I do not put this past the criminal communist democrat party to do the same.
Heh
How about blaming the lefty greenies that mandated cage free chickens for egg production into California. How about blaming $6 diesel. How about blaming expensive feed that can’t be transported. How about blaming California CARB that banned all diesel trucks 2010 or older in California. How about blaming the California agricultural regulatory woke disaster. No let’s blame bird flu. Like blaming COVID for all of our nation’s woes.
Natural supply/demand during a short crisis would not have increased corporate profits to such an extent.
There is clear collusion by the largest corps to use every tiny “crisis” as an excuse for increased profits on essential products. All prices are jacked up and in line long before they are impacted by said crisis.
They also bribe lawmakers to make it as difficult as possible for competitors to enter the market. We are even seeing “the law” use crisis as an excuse to come after people growing their own and further artificially jack up prices.
I grow most of my own food and once you do that you will realize we are clearly being scammed by special interests for far inferior product...
Gouging almost never comes from producers. Wholesalers and retailers are the ones that recognize they have inventory that just went up in value.
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