Chicken is still the cheapest thing out there, but it may go higher in the future.
I still remember the beef shortage of 1974. I noticed more fat being left on the meat.
My parents remembered the beef glut of the 1930s when government agents bought all they could find, dug a hole and shot and buried them, to create a shortage and get the price up. They would NOT allow anyone to cut a steak from the shot cattle.
Chicken really isn’t the cheapest thing out there anymore, at least where I live and I live in “chicken country.”
Your average modern chicken house holds 35,000 broiler/fryers, across the road from me there are 5 such house and the farmer has 12 more just like it on other properties - and that is just one farmer I know. With 2 processing plants in this county, it’s pretty hard to swallow low end whole chickens costing $1.29/lb on sale.
I remember that in 1974. About every few months there was a shortage and price hike in coffee, tuna, sugar, etc.
In the 8th grade I did a political cartoon (class assignment) of a butcher behind a counter of expensive meat with signs like “Layaway Available” and “Credit Cards Accepted” etc.
Got an “A”! lol