Four Companies Control 85% of US Meat Production.

Richard Mellor

An interesting look in to the meat industry in the US. As the video points out, four meatpacking companies process 85% of the all cattle produced in the US.  This monopoly the narrator traces back to the early eighties and Reagan describing what she refers to as "conservative school of economics". What she is describing is the neo-liberal period and the doctrine of the privatization of everything and the consolidation of industry. The UFCW Local P9 strike in Austen MN was a consequence of this period as were the numerous other strikes that took place in the 1980's, two Greyhound strikes, eastern Airlines, Detroit Teamster strikes and so on.  

These policies, deregulation and the war against organized labor did not begin with Reagan, Jimmy Carter deregulated the airlines and set the faster process in motion and also used the threat of Taft Hartley against the miners in 1978. At the same time, Reagan's co-thinker, Margaret Thatcher in the UK set about to smash the National Union of Miners (NUM) the mighty union that lost the Conservative government of Edward Heath an election in 1974 after a successful strike two years early. The 1984 assault on the National Union of Miners and their communities provoked a year long strike and was a decade in the making.

The narrator above talks of the buying up of all the smaller producers by these four major companies, Tyson, JBS, Cargill and national Beef has led to 40% of cattle ranchers, predominantly family concerns, going out of business. Organized labor and workers in general have potential allies here but there is no attempt on the part of the heads of organized labor to build such potentially powerful links, instead, these worshipers of the so-called free market have, through their allegiance to capitalism, cooperated in the destruction of these institutions.

This gobbling up of small farmers gives the, "illlusion of choice" the narrator says as the packaging makes a point of making the name of the original producer prominent. But it is not just meatpacking that does this. The same goes for newspapers and even in politics and the concept of democratic elections. The US electorate, having only two parties of billionaires to choose, from, an "illusion of choice" have pretty much abandoned the electoral process altogether.

Reading Fast Food Nation one gets an idea of how damaging industrial agriculture and food production is to humans as workers, consumers and to the environment. Cattle have three stomachs and  are supposed to eat grass but are crammed in to massive pens and fed soy protein. They are often up to their own ankles in feces and muck. 

The total beef production in the United States is estimated to reach 27.54 billion pounds in 2021, up from 27.15 billion pounds in the previous year. Overall, Americans ate about 222 pounds of meat per person in 2018 or about 800 quarter pound burgers

At 222 pounds per person, overall meat and poultry consumption comes out to the equivalent of more than 800 quarter-pound burgers per person when measured by weight, or about 2.4 burgers per day. Quartz.com

The truth is, we eat far too much meat. Billions of dollars are spent marketing it and encouraging people to consume it. This also has an effect on the environment due to the millions of cattle that are produced and the methane they release as well as the destruction of rain forests to make way for cattle ranches.

Food production, just like health care, transportation, education, housing or any important social need should not be in private hands and set in to motion on the basis of profit. All the regulation in the world cannot and has not tamed the wild market beast.

In a previous post a veterinary doctor described the consequences of industrial food production and you can watch that video at this link.