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I oppose beef subsidies, but the unsubsidized price seems entirely fabricated. How can $38 billion across 80 billion pounds of meat and 25 billion gallons of milk make hamburger $25 cheaper per pound?
Farm subsidies are a thing in general. Is there a comparison to subsidies for crops? Not vegan but I support cutting beef & dairy subsidies for sure.
You don't want to even start to look into subsidies for things like grain and corn. The subsidies for those are higher than the beef and dairy industry.
True, but they also subsidize the beef and dairy industry. Cattle are fed not only the grain, but the stalks. Feed use ... typically accounts for about 40 percent of total domestic corn use.
So the cattle subsidies you see quoted for beef and dairy are usually an underestimate.
But those don't kill us and our planet
Do you know how much nitrogen fertilizer corn needs? It is one of the heaviest users of petrochemical fertilizer.
More overall to feed it to cattle since that will always have us growing more plants than we would otherwise.
Zero.
The natives that cultivated corn never used petrochemicals. They planted beans with the corn, which provides all the nitrogen needed.
Yes planting the three sisters is a great way to farm in the arid west. It also requires the crops to be hand planted, weeded and harvested. There is no way that this could be done on a large enough scale to feed the current population or even the population 50 years ago.
There is a reason monocroping and petrochemical fertilizer exists. It is the most harmful form of farming, but is also the one way that enough food can be grown.
I dislike the current farming system, but to go back 100+ years to a time. When the only way to have the labor needed to farm was sharecropping or worse doesn't seem like a solution to me.
The reason it exists is because less people contribute to the growing process.
Its entirely false to think that we cannot feed our existing population without mechanized monocropping. We just need every able bodied person to contribute a few weeks out of the year to the fields. It is a shift, bit its not asking much.
Stop spreading misinformation. We don't need oil. We van easily feed everyone with sustainable methods. What we can't do is keep burning fossil fuels.
For the EU it is 82% of the subsidies that go the animal industry: https://phys.org/news/2024-04-eu-farming-subsidies-emissions-intensive.html
Hamburger meat 😂 Why would they not call it ground beef?
Or rotting, ground-up flesh from many cattle.
Don't be a dick
I find that very hard to believe. I live in New Zealand where there are no subsidies on beef and a pound - roughly 500grams - of minced beef would cost you under NZ $10 - less than $6 US. $30 US sounds utterly unbelievable
Ground beef prices are lower in the USA compared to New Zealand due to government subsidies for grain production, which makes it cheaper for American cattle to be grain-fed. In contrast, New Zealand has eliminated agricultural subsidies, so their cattle are primarily grass-fed[3].
Specifically:
-
In the USA, grain farmers receive heavy government subsidies, artificially driving down grain prices. This makes it economical for large cattle operations to feed grain to their animals[2].
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New Zealand is an island nation, so it is not feasible to ship in large amounts of grain to feed cattle. It makes more economic sense for them to raise cattle on grass[2].
-
The USA's indirect farm support programs, like buybacks and checkoffs, aim to boost demand for meat, thereby raising its price. However, these subsidies only slightly lower grain costs[3].
-
Nations that have eliminated farm subsidies, like New Zealand, have not seen rising meat prices or declines in meat consumption after removing subsidies[3].
So in summary, while both countries produce grass-fed beef, the availability of cheap grain through subsidies allows American producers to offer ground beef at lower prices compared to New Zealand's grass-fed beef, which lacks the same level of government support[1][2][3].
Citations: [1] http://newzealmeats.com/blog/nz-grass-fed-beef-high-quality/ [2] https://www.folsompointnutrition.com/blog/new-zealand-argentinian-and-american-liver-supplements-what-are-the-differences [3] https://faunalytics.org/why-is-meat-so-cheap/ [4] https://www.reddit.com/r/newzealand/comments/omxum2/why_red_meat_is_getting_more_expensive/ [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_New_Zealand
new zealand is much much different, they have almost no factory farms, this is not a global study, it was specifically the usa, thanks for the comment though
The point seems to have gone over your head. NZ is a smaller, unsubsidised, more expensive market than the US and ground beef doesn't cost anywhere near the $30 US per pound you are claiming.
Right, why is that not the case in other countries? If this were true, most of the world would be vegetarian
Most of the world does indeed eats little to no meat, especially red meat. In the EU, these kind of subsidies also exist.
this post was submitted on 24 Apr 2024
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