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High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

mattstoller.substack.com

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Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#151

Post by sanp »

kurthr wrote: post #127
voakbasda wrote: post #10

As a small farmer, I can tell you: independent small-scale farming is not profitable in any meaningful manner. Government is actively killing it, by giving away every possible concession to Big Ag. The food in stores is pretty much all garbage compared to food raised on small farms. It sickens me to see things go this way, but this is the reality that we have created.

I'm not sure the government is actively killing it... they just aren't doing anything about the oligopolies and collusion that have always developed in these sort of situations. That may seem subtle, but many argue that we want to make the government do less to "keep them off our backs". Well, guess what these are the consequences. These markets may be "free", but they are not efficient, in fact they are arguably cor…

And it's many of the same constituents (i.e., farmers in red states) voting for the party of "small government".

Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#152

Post by seoaeu »

narrator wrote: post #133
LesZedCB wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

can you elaborate? considering we (humanity) are de-sequestering thousands of acres of captured carbon in order to create new cattle farms, i really hope by destroy you don't mean monopolize and grow.

Yes, many rich people would love everyone to be vegan, or at least eat insects instead of meat, mainly for environmental and animal rights reasons.

Wait, you're criticizing people for caring about the environment and animal rights?

Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#153

Post by tsimionescu »

cheese_goddess wrote: post #103
adrr wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Poultry that is free range is more stringy and chewy. It also much leaner and smaller. I lived off free range chicken when i worked summers on my grandfather's farm in Hawaii. It is all personal preference. If you order chicken pho at a Vietnamese restaurant it will most likely be free range chicken or what they call "Walking chicken". It is completely different than a Tyson Chicken from Costco with oversized breast…

Really free-range poultry (backyard chicken, rather than chicken grown in a factory with a tiny yard just enough to satisfy free range regulations) is like you say, tough, stringy, full of muscle, with normal-sized breasts and its meat is dark. It's no good for roasting because you really have to boil it for a couple of hours at least in order to get it to the point it's edible. I made the mistake once to only cook a…

Chicken meat and hen meat are different things. Big stores very rarely sell hen (or rooster) meat, normally only the meat of young, immature chicks is consumed, free-range or not.

This is like the difference between veal and beef. The younger animal has softer meat and a different kind of fat.

Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#154

Post by markdown »

knuthsat wrote: post #137
markdown wrote: post #124

Anyone interested in this should check out the Just a Few Acres Farm channel on youtube. It's a wonderful, wonderful channel that I've spent hours watching, and I'm not even American. https://www.youtube.com/c/JustaFewAcresFarm?app=desktop

Damn, first video I open is of castrating piglets. Can't believe it's done while the animal is awake and with no sedatives. Brutal. I'd rather have a farm raising plants than do that kind of stuff.

> I'd rather have a farm raising plants than do that kind of stuff.

I can understand that if you're vegetarian. If you eat meat though, what goes on in this farm is what you'd you'd want for the food you eat.

BTW there is a good reason these animals get castrated, which is far more than we can say for all the millions of human babies that have the ends of their dicks chopped off in the US every year.

Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#155

Post by narrator »

seoaeu wrote: post #152
narrator wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, many rich people would love everyone to be vegan, or at least eat insects instead of meat, mainly for environmental and animal rights reasons.

Wait, you're criticizing people for caring about the environment and animal rights?

I never said it was good or bad. It's interesting that you would assume that.

Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#156

Post by giantg2 »

sputknick wrote: post #141
giantg2 wrote: post #6

Sounds like independents need to band together and vertically integrate by creating a meat packing facility that serves them and passes on the profits. Similar to, albeit on a much smaller scale, how the local grange can allow farms to plan who is planting what and organize who owns what specialized equipment and the reasonable rate for them to utilize it at others' request.

This exists, think of the places the process deer during hunting season, they process personally owned livestock when its not deer season. The problem is regulation. They are not USDA facilities and therefore cannot process beef for anyone but the owner of the cow.

Some places will sell you the live cow and then trailer it to the butcher for you, as a way around this.

Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#157

Post by phillypham »

HeyLaughingBoy wrote: post #123
jdavis703 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is all the pasture raised, permaculture, organic blah blah stuff all so expensive if it’s not profitable? If I’m paying $12 for a dozen eggs when I can get non-sustainable, conventionally raised eggs from some megacorp for $3 then where is all the money going? Any consumer paying $12 for eggs certainly wouldn’t mind $13, which could then be profit.

Holy christ. If I could $12/dozen for my eggs I'd start raising chickens again! Where are you buying those?

At Seattle and NYC farmers markets, I regularly pay $12 a dozen. The eggs are often sold out, so others are, too.

Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#158

Post by giantg2 »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #150
giantg2 wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a duopoly, which is hopefully better than a monopoly. It forces competition and will at least keep the independent people solvent. Hell, you can structure it where the processing fee is set and the producers set their own sale prices. What other options. Is there for beef production?

You misunderstand. It's not that there was one monopoly wholesaler and now there are two. It's that there was one monopoly wholesaler, and there still is, but now it's negotiating with a new cartel of manufacturers. That's not better. Don't form a new cartel, break up the old monopoly.

Who is this monopoly wholesaler?

Also, it's not a cartel if they don't control/regulate production.

Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#159

Post by aksss »

tuatoru wrote: post #37
orang2tang wrote: post #3

This is happening to every industry. There is an obvious consolidation and massive wealth transfer still ongoing. Sickening

This process is intrinsic to capitalism, though. Every company has to get bigger by swallowing others, or instead be swallowed by another company that does it. The board game "Monopoly" is a pretty good simplified simulation of the system's structures and operation. Fun for all in the early stages, not so much in the end game.

Monopoly is simplified not only in its portrayal of one market, but in the fact that it's only concerned with one market. The reality of capitalism also includes this dynamic of new markets being created organically and deliberately, particularly as some markets close up. Innovation and entrepreneurial endeavors enabled by legal profit incentive are a big part of the full landscape of capitalism and are missing from any lessons we might try to project from Monopoly.

Re: High beef prices and the destruction of independent cattle ranching

#160

Post by nickstinemates »

gopher_space wrote: post #145
jdavis703 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This all sounds pretty labor intensive to me. About how many hours per year do you think goes in to this? Like is this something that could be a weekend hobby? Or does it require more substantial lifestyle change?

We used to go in with the neighbors on 4H auctions. You just need a big freezer.

Or your local butcher - they can source from farms directly, know who does slaughter, and will usually give you a good deal on whole animals.

This is how I started with pigs.

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