Y’all. Yes, you read that headline correctly. The price of eggs dropped 12.7% last month. Honestly and truly, they did! Maybe, just maybe, we’re finally able to start moving past the bird flu epidemic and have stable production again. While they were so hard to find, except for organic, which were $$$$, I didn’t realize how many things required eggs, outside of me making egg salad (duh, right?). I used them to mix meatloaf. We needed them for cornbread. It’s all sorts of little things that you don’t think about. I must admit I was a bit surprised by it!
So, it became a matter of planning. We’d think about what dinner we were going to make for the week, and for the things that go with them (such as the aforementioned cornbread), and go on a quest to find eggs. It was fun and frustrating at the same time. If none were to be found (i.e., I gave up after checking 5 or 6 places), then we would have to look at alternates. We never really thought about it up to then.
They could continue to fall this month, too: The USDA reported last week that a dozen large white-shell eggs now cost $3.30 on average, down a whopping 69 cents from a week before.
It’s a remarkable reversal after egg prices surged in each of the past five months – and 17 of the past 19 months – because of a deadly avian flu epidemic that necessitated the mass culling of egg-laying hens.
“Maybe the worst of EggGate has passed,” Tyler Schipper, associate professor in economics and data analysis at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, told CNN.
Now, I have to interrupt this broadcast for a few moments. EggGate? LOLOL I wish I had known about that name before, because it would have been fun to have and there would be multiple chances to use it! But, back to our regularly scheduled program.
Nevertheless, egg prices remain significantly higher now than before the latest bird flu outbreak, and they cost 49.3% more last month than they did a year earlier. Eggs are still more expensive than when Trump took office, according to the BLS. Egg prices this past Easter, which typically rise in the run-up to the holiday, were the highest for any Easter on record, the USDA reported.
Well before last month’s decline, Trump had been touting falling egg prices as a sign that his administration’s plan to lower prices for consumers had been working. In February, the USDA announced an initiative to lower egg prices, including increased biosecurity on egg-laying farms, aid to farmers who have lost flocks, and temporary lifting of restrictions on egg imports.
So prices are falling, and really, it has nothing to do with Agent Orange. Everything that caused the shortage is finally recovering. It must have been devastating to those who had the flocks and had to cull them. Can you imagine having to do something like that? Something you depend on for your job? Something to be able to take care of your family? I can’t imagine it at all. There’s just nothing I can use for a comparison in my life, so I have no way *to* understand it.
Despite Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins’ far more conservative estimate that egg prices would normalize in the summer, Trump last month said, “As you know, the cost of eggs has come down like 93, 94% since we took office.” Those percentage declines Trump stated are not close to accurate, but we now know that consumer egg prices were, indeed, falling sharply when Trump made those remarks (the Consumer Price Index data wasn’t out yet to confirm or deny Trump’s claims).
It appears as though Trump may have been talking about wholesale prices, which had been tumbling throughout March before normalizing in recent weeks. Nevertheless, wholesale prices fell by half, not close to the 90%+ figures Trump was citing.
The USDA says consumer prices finally fell as demand for eggs decreased and avian flu cases have fallen. Many groceries, including large chains like Costco, had limited customers’ purchases because of egg shortages.
So, Trump’s claim that consumer egg prices are down is finally true, even if the timing of his claim and the wild percentages he threw around were grossly inaccurate.
It still had nothing to do with him. It had to do with the remaining birds the “farmers” (Apologies, I don’t know the right word for chickens) have, and likely getting new ones. I really hope the trend continues. I want these people to get their livelihoods back. I’m lucky. I had Social Security and my writing. I wouldn’t know what to do if I didn’t have those. I hope you folks think about that, too. It’s painful to think about, but we could all learn from it. Oh, and Snarks -R- Us stopped by to ask you to bust on El Presidente Imbécil and tell him that the trend looks good, but he had nothing to do with it. If we’re lucky, we’ll get a couple of 3 am rants on Truth Social. Fun stuff! Thanks for sticking with me!
*****And now, please read ******
Zoomers, we are always in need of donations. It’s been an especially rough month, and my own health has not been great these past few weeks, which just adds to the frustration. Anything you can spare will be immensely appreciated. And thank you to all who have donated generously already. Ursula
It’s kind of funny to me that Drumpf would make claims of “93, 94%” declines (even for wholesale prices) since no one was seeing anything close to that level of drop in the grocery stores. And, even more oddly, the fact that Drumpf was NOT slamming retailers for their “price gouging” (which would be the NATURAL and NORMAL reaction from a politician–even named Drumpf) by still charging so much.
I mean, even if wholesale egg prices had been $6 a dozen on Hell on Earth Day–I mean, “Inauguration Day”–a drop of “93%” by last month would mean that wholesale price would only be 42 cents a dozen (93% of $6 is $5.58; $6 – $5.58 = $0.42). But, if retailers were still charging $8 or more a dozen (not really sure what kind of markup retailers would put on eggs but $8 would be a 33% markup, probably on the high end–I’d think a 10-15% markup would be more likely but, let’s just use the $8 price) when they were only paying 42¢ a dozen, that would be a textbook case of price gouging and investigations would definitely be in order. Of course, we all know Drumpf can’t help but lie as easily as he breathes (it’s probably easier for him to lie than to breathe) and the man has NO knowledge of anything in the real world. It wouldn’t surprise me if he’d gotten a paper (in crayon) that said prices were down 9.3-9.4% and he just ignored that pesky decimal point when he decided to blather.
Oh lawdy, I was fascinated until that last sentence, which promptly made me spit coffee on my monitor. Well said, for *everything*!