this post was submitted on 29 Mar 2025
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[–] lemmyng@lemmy.ca 230 points 1 week ago (6 children)

Link to the actual article. It's a good read, and in no way does it try to justify the raise in egg prices. It talks about the history of chicken and egg farming in the 20th century, the supply chain needed to bring as many eggs to consumers, and is critical of how the growing demand led to factory farming and horrible conditions for the chickens.

[–] teslasaur@lemmy.world 67 points 1 week ago

Stop bringing logic to these rage baiters. The vibe gets weird.

[–] Catoblepas@lemmy.blahaj.zone 39 points 1 week ago (2 children)

For such a long article it’s really disappointing they didn’t at all go into how chicken farmers themselves are ratfucked by contracts with processing plants and live below the poverty line if they don’t have a second job.

[–] theo@lemmy.world 10 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I am not all that knowledgeable on the US egg industry, but wouldn't this mainly just the small scale farmers that would be struggling?

As it mentioned in the article, the large companies will have the leverage to raise the prices (article describes it as cartelization). And are then encouraged to keep the scale with compensation and I guess subsidies.

[–] Catoblepas@lemmy.blahaj.zone 10 points 1 week ago

My knowledge is more related to the meat side of things than the egg side honestly, but here’s a citation: 70 percent of chicken farmers with no other job live below the poverty line. That’s not people who work on a chicken farm (although they’re certainly not paid well either), that’s the people who own it.

These farms may technically be ‘small scale’ in that they aren’t owned by a giant corporation, but they often contain multiple times as many chickens as their European counterparts, in more crowded conditions, which is part of why disease spreads so fast.

For meat, the reason the farmers are in this mess is because separate companies buy and process the chicken, and they won’t buy from you if you don’t follow their arbitrary and frequently changing guidelines. They also don’t pay a given amount per pound, they pay you depending on the yields other chicken farmers got on their farms. And the farmers don’t have another place to sell their chickens, it’s these companies or nothing, as 20 companies control basically the entire US market.

[–] Omegamanthethird@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago

John Oliver had a good episode on it. It's been almost 10 years (holy crap) since I've seen it, but I remember it being pretty accurate from my experience.

https://youtu.be/X9wHzt6gBgI

Also, apparently they started uploading full episodes because they uploaded this full episode last year.

https://youtu.be/z3YtQleycpg

[–] index@sh.itjust.works 20 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Only female chickens makes egg. Male baby chickens gets throw in the meat grinder alive.

https://youtu.be/udSiluTAOaQ?t=136

[–] XM34@feddit.org 24 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Praise to the EU. Male chicken shredding has been outlawed since 2022!

Edit: I was pattially wrong about this. The ban is only in effect in some of the members. Namely: Germany, France, Italy Luxemberg and Austria The EU itself is still in the process of deciding on such a law.

[–] Nimrod@lemm.ee 3 points 1 week ago (2 children)

So what happens to them? Just a slightly more humane death before they reach a week old?

[–] XM34@feddit.org 9 points 1 week ago (1 children)

As far as I know most get sold to meat farms where they're raised to about 1 year old with the other meat chickens and then slaughtered for meat. Still far from ideal, but way better than being shredded right after birth.

[–] WhiteOakBayou@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

1 year old seems like a crazy long time. I thought most chickens were harvested in like 6 to 8 weeks.

I'm under the same impression, but I assume that since they arent meat chickens that they need the extra time to grow big enough to he harvested?

[–] ReiRose@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)
[–] Nimrod@lemm.ee 2 points 1 week ago

Awesome. Thank you for the source. I knew of the technology a long while ago, but I had no idea that France and Germany both enforce its usage.

The best option is still to stop eating animal products, but this is still a win for overall animal welfare.

[–] GeneralEmergency@lemmy.world 14 points 1 week ago

Get a load of this nerd READING like a massive NERD. Just join the rest of us free thinkers in judging by the cover.

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[–] finitebanjo@lemmy.world 55 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (4 children)

One could argue that Capitalism doesn't have this problem and that the current USA is much closer to how the USSR and China opetate.

Canada has eggs. EU countries have eggs.

[–] Sektor@lemmy.world 30 points 1 week ago (4 children)

10 eggs in my EU country is from 2,5 to 3,5€, depending of the way they keep the chickens.

[–] jmcs@discuss.tchncs.de 16 points 1 week ago

I suspect that in some countries supermarket cartels are using the American egg shortage being in the news to increase their margins.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

You can get 15 at ~2,55€ where I live

[–] elucubra@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

What sick, uncivilized, heathen place is that where eggs sell by the 15!?¿! Infidels!!!

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Different size cartons, that was the best per kg

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[–] Aliktren@lemmy.world 4 points 1 week ago

We had so many eggs this week the dogs got one as a treat lol.

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[–] CallateCoyote@lemmy.world 30 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I'm so fucking sick of hearing about egg prices. It's the least important thing happening in this dumpster fire of a country right now. I still eat eggs everyday by the way. It costs like $2 more each week. Oh no.

[–] Tetragrade@leminal.space 25 points 1 week ago (1 children)

It's important because it's the central promise of our system. Capitalism/Liberal Democracy/Whatever, it doesn't promise equality, or world peace, or spiritual enlightenment: It promises that you can buy cheap consumer crap, and now it can't even deliver that.

[–] Sauerkraut@discuss.tchncs.de 12 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Exactly. Capitalism is only tolerable as long as the material conditions of the working class improve decade after decade. The average worker has been in steady decline for 50 years, but over the last 25 years nearly the entire working class has been suffering.

[–] kunaltyagi@programming.dev 4 points 1 week ago

If the growth goes away, people have to wonder what they are getting in exchange, in any system, not just capitalism. For example, this is the same expectation people have from the Communist Party in China. Most people will agree that givint up their freedoms was worth the huge improvement in quality of life.

[–] 7toed@midwest.social 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

But hey! We aren't talking about innocents now being slaughtered by our operations halfway across the world (again)... almost like a recurring theme...

[–] NewSocialWhoDis@lemm.ee 7 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

The media is just playing to the electorate there, I'm afraid.

I watched the YouTube stream of a recent Maryland townhall: dark blue state, all Democrat Representatives and Senators speaking and taking questions, hosted by a Democrat county executive. Someone got up and confronted them about the immigrants abducted by ICE being held in Baltimore Harbor and not allowed to see their lawyers. Multiple people in the live chat started complaining that they weren't discussing real issues like Social Security and Medicare. ... Even though they had discussed it earlier. Americans are fundamentally selfish.

[–] 7toed@midwest.social 2 points 1 week ago

I would wager that some American demographics are a lot more selfish than others... I digress, because it doesn't change two facts:

Media has long manufactured consent (even lying in doing so 🤯, see: Iraq) for various attrocities committed by the united states government, regardless of popular support.

And second, the gutting of social security by bypassing budget approvals (infraction of sep. of powers) and kidnapping of students based on ideology and without due process (just authortarianism) are part of the same issue currently afflicting the US. If for some reason individuals drive a cudgel between these issues, they're more than either ignorant to or complicit with the issue they whatabout over.

But on that, given your anecdote is taken from a livestream chat, you may be underestimating just how much astroturfing takes place. We've known part of the playbook is to completely overwhelm our media intake, desaturating perceived potency of headlines and happenings. I would go as far to take wedging issues like that to be another tactic... as we've seen that strategy successfully work to drive flimsy democrats to 180 on LGBT rights.

If you assume the worst of the people you will need to work with, you won't get to influence them enough to understand the nature of the issue at hand

[–] werefreeatlast@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago

Yeah, why don't we just let the electoral college choose our next president again next time? I'm sure they'll pick the best kin...president possible. I love how democracy works! We suffer so a hand full of people can make the right decision. Sometimes the hard decision. Like say we were brown and the decision was to fall or not to fall into an abyss. The electoral college would quickly see the situation and rescue us. Thanks to the electoral college the potholes get quickly filled and my kid's school is not closing soon.

[–] wischi@programming.dev 13 points 1 week ago

If you really think about it a ton of things are way too cheap so in a lot of scenarios it's way cheaper to buy something new compared to repairing something old.

Think of a nail for example, from digging up some rocks that contain a bit more iron than other rocks, process them through many stages many of us (including me) have no idea, just to ship them around the planet. But if you have a bent or really messed up nail, everybody would just throw that refined material away because it's cheaper than a cent.

"I didn't even want those eggs in the first place and besides, they're probably sour."

[–] MuskyMelon@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago

Yeah war on eggs!! You're a traitor if you eat eggs!!!

[–] grue@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The amount of manufactured consent is too damn high!

[–] RaoulDook@lemmy.world 4 points 1 week ago

Yep eggs are cheap because chickens shit them out profusely. It only takes a small flock of 4+ birds to make more than a family needs. I know several people with backyard coops and pens who have more eggs than they need, giving them away.

[–] medicsofanarchy@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago

tl;dr: Is this meant to normalize higher egg prices?

[–] zephorah@lemm.ee -1 points 1 week ago (4 children)

Protein replacement for poor people who could not afford meat. I don’t know what to recommend now. No one wants to live on beans, that’s misery personified.

[–] ftbd@feddit.org 22 points 1 week ago (1 children)

What's wrong with beans and lentils?

[–] Aux@feddit.uk -3 points 1 week ago

They're disgusting, not a source of all amino acids and give you diarrhea. Fuck em!

[–] sunoc@sh.itjust.works 21 points 1 week ago (4 children)

Lentils are the way: it’s cheap and pretty tasty as a stew or a curry !

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[–] huppakee@lemm.ee 7 points 1 week ago

I just posted this link on another comment but the content validates me being considered a spammer imho

Eat Beans, Not Beings—10 Reasons to Stock Up on This Superfood https://www.peta2.com/lifestyle/beans/

[–] ElcaineVolta@kbin.melroy.org 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

what we do to the animals is misery personified.

[–] Aux@feddit.uk -1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)
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