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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

#101

Post by jghn »

CreepGin wrote: post #70
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I buy grass-fed beef from my neighbor. There's no difference as far as I can see. I like to support my neighbor, but there's no magic, no difference cooking, no startling color-change tricks as reported elsewhere in this thread.

We have opposite experiences with pork and poultry. The meat we get from local homesteads are noticeably way better than store bought. Maybe beef is a different story. I don't know... During 2020 summer, we raised 4 peking ducks in our backyard. We gifted some of the processed meat to extended family members. And to this day, they still can't stop talking about how good the meat were.

I get most of my meat from a local farm share. I've noticed that the largest difference vs grocery store meat by far is the fat in the pork we get. Poultry in general would be next, followed by the actual pork meat, and then beef. But yes, it's nice to get poultry that tastes like ... something.

The largest difference at first with beef was that it was grass fed and I was not used to that. But now I tend to buy grass fed beef when I do get it from the supermarket and thus don't notice a big difference vs my farm meat.

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

#102

Post by goodluckchuck »

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.

No post body was provided.

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

#103

Post by cheese_goddess »

adrr wrote: post #93
CreepGin wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have opposite experiences with pork and poultry. The meat we get from local homesteads are noticeably way better than store bought. Maybe beef is a different story. I don't know... During 2020 summer, we raised 4 peking ducks in our backyard. We gifted some of the processed meat to extended family members. And to this day, they still can't stop talking about how good the meat were.

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 hen for half an hour, like I'd do for supermarket chicken and I spent the night chewing until my jaws ached (I didn't want to throw it out. Poor bird died so I could eat it; so I ate it).

That said, real-free-range chicken makes the most unbelievably godly soup. They have this amazing yellow fat and their skin is thick with it, so they make a really thick broth. Just add a few vegetables, a bit of celery, some carrots, potatoes, and you don't even need rice or anything else to thicken it. I suspect it's that kind of chicken that people mean when they say that chicken soup is good for you when you're sick. It's the kind of soup that could raise the dead.

Edit - I forgot about the bones. Real free range chicken bones are hard. You can't just snap them between your fingers. Well I can't anyway. They're like real bones. Amaze!

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

#104

Post by lettergram »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #54
lettergram wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having been all over the country it’s amazing to me how different Wyoming and say Tennessee are. The people in Tennessee already had to deal with the federal government implementing policies destroying the domestic tobacco industry. Btw this just means foreign farmers reap the profits. The federal government made the input costs to tobacco prohibitively expensive through taxes and regulations. They then converted mos…

> All the farmers complain around me about “getting good help”. I assume this is due to the low pay to quality of life ratio offered by farming jobs.

Getting people drug addicted removes potential help and illegal immigration drives down prices

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

#105

Post by chrisseaton »

Mandatum wrote: post #92
bobthepanda wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Farmers already do this, and they're called cooperatives. Some US big name brands that are cooperatives are Darigold, Land O' Lakes, Organic Valley, and Sunkist. The largest company in New Zealand is a dairy cooperative: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fonterra It's interesting that this is not common for meat, when it is for dairy. Wonder why that is.

Because meat isn't as commoditized, there's too many different grades and products. When 70%+ of your output turns into shelf-stable milk powder, it's all the same. Fonterra has kept local milk supplies in New Zealand at export prices for more than 15 years. It wasn't until recently that smaller independent co-op's formed and began selling processor-to-table and exporting themselves. However now many of the processor…

Meat is literally traded as a commodity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_Hog

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

#106

Post by zo1 »

beebmam wrote: post #60
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Easy enough to solve: tax wealth and redistribute it with a UBI. These are extremely independent problems. The problem with concentration isn't taxes, it's a regulatory environment that promotes concentration. You take money from Bezos, it doesn't change the size of Amazon. A UBI would help some by making it easier to start a small business, but unless you address the underlying regulatory problems that give every…

Quoted post unavailable.

Not OP, but 10 or 15 years ago sure maybe. The problem is we can't look at it now that Amazon is huge and deregulate. If we deregulated now, Amazon will absolutely destroy any new competition.

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

#107

Post by vwcx »

voakbasda wrote: post #99
bee_rider wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any thoughts on Mobile Slaughter Units? Your focus on being less cruel to your cows is pretty admirable, but I don't really see how average consumers could evaluate whether their local farm is: * Putting in the sort of extra effort that you are * Following safety protocols more generally I dunno. I'm not super attached to meat, so I'd probably quit eating it before putting in the effort to eat it ethically. Actually…

The USDA allows Mobile Slaughter Units. My state does not have one, because it's too expensive to bootstrap. We're talking millions of dollars of capital expenditures to get one running, because you still need a non-mobile facility in which to finish processing and pack the meat. None of the existing processors are willing to invest in such a venture, when their existing facilities are increasingly being regulated ou…

One counterexample to this might be the field harvesting of bison. Starting to see more 'artisanal' buffalo ranching that stress the positive ethics and efficiency of slaughtering in the field as needed. Of course, they still do need a partnership with a local processor to make field harvesting work.

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

#108

Post by yurishimo »

programmertote wrote: post #88
MomoXenosaga wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The food in stores is cheap. And that matters to consumers more than whatever alleged quality small-time farmers can produce (was food actually better a hundred years ago? Doubt).

I highly recommend you to visit third world countries and sample food from there. I grew up in Burma and have been living in the US for almost 20 years. Every time I went back to Burma, I buy milk, egg and chicken from local markets. I boil the milk and egg, and make curry out of the chicken. The milk is super creamy and if you boil it for 2-3 times, you get like 1-cm creamy foam on top. I tried the same with Costco…

If your chicken smells/tastes fishy, then it's going bad. The fat oxidization causes that smell if I'm not mistaken.

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

#109

Post by topkai22 »

rch wrote: post #87
topkai22 wrote: post #73

I have in-laws in the independent ranching industry and the lack of slaughter house/packer capacity is a real problem. Around here at least supply and demand is working as there is a company trying to open up a new plant, but it is taking years to get past NIMBYism and environmental reviews. I wonder if an alternative model is to look into public/private partnerships where the government establishes the land and perm…

Do you happen to know the approximate location?

Northern Nevada (Reno-Carson-Fernley-etc)

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

#110

Post by User23 »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #54
lettergram wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having been all over the country it’s amazing to me how different Wyoming and say Tennessee are. The people in Tennessee already had to deal with the federal government implementing policies destroying the domestic tobacco industry. Btw this just means foreign farmers reap the profits. The federal government made the input costs to tobacco prohibitively expensive through taxes and regulations. They then converted mos…

> All the farmers complain around me about “getting good help”. I assume this is due to the low pay to quality of life ratio offered by farming jobs.

Rural birth rates plummeted so there are fewer potential workers. Add to that the methamphetamine and opioid epidemics and the pool of potential domestic farm workers is tiny. The ones that do the work are the ones that love the lifestyle.

That means that even small farmers lean hard on H-2B to pick up the slack. Interestingly those wages are actually pretty competitive: around $12 an hour plus room and board.

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