I wonder if you’re like me and think many crazy things are going on in this world right now besides COVID–19. One example of this is my liking of a good steak cooked over charcoal – in other words, a hearty steak dinner. The local stores have beef for sale, but at five and six dollars per pound for hamburger and over $10 a pound for steaks, there won’t be any steak dinners in this household. I thought that the farmers must be enjoying great prices for their cattle. However, when I looked, that’s not true. The farmers got their highest prices for cattle just after the first of the year – before the COVID-19 struck. They are now getting some of the lowest prices in quite a while.
I wondered if there might not be another cause as they say more people are staying home, and as a result, the demand for beef has risen by some estimates as much as 90%. You would think after demand was growing up by much that the farmer should be enjoying an increase in price, which wasn’t right. It turns out that four companies control all of the beef processing. They are the ones who are getting very rich not only at the farmer’s expense but also at our expense. What is the government doing? “Looking into it” is the only response.
I’m sure you are not surprised that the current government in Washington favors big business. The Republicans always have. I’m sure it wouldn’t take much more than a few well-chosen words by the administration to see cattle prices go up for farmers and go down for consumers. It seems only fair, but politics by any party is the definition of unfair. You can write or call your congressman, but you will get the same response, “looking into it.” I think a better approach might be to tell your representatives that if beef prices don’t go down for the consumer, you are going to vote for the other party.
