Americans on budgets push up price of "cheap" beef

[Newsjock]

Source: Reuters

With more Americans tightening their belts, demand for cheaper cuts of U.S. beef has actually pushed the price of select-grade beef higher than the generally more expensive choice cuts.

For the first time in nearly two years, select-grade beef prices are above those for better-quality choice grade, according to U.S. government data.

... The inversion of the so-called choice-select spread was the third widest since the U.S. Agriculture Department began tracking the data in 2001 and only the tenth time the spread has inverted. (

... Consumers are also grappling with record-high food prices and turning to normally economical choices, including select beef cuts such as the chuck or round commonly ground into hamburgers.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/14/us-usa-beef-prices-idUSTRE71D7D120110214

[katnapped]

1. Damn useless eaters!

Why can't they just DIE and get it over with! :sarcasm:

[madrchsod]

2. get used to it for at least three more years....

[damntexdem]

3. "Up goes the price of shoddy."

Sorry, I just had to.

Well, all I can say is "let them eat sirloin."

Meanwhile, the food conglomerates are laughing all the way to bank over how we're falling for the "it's just supply and demand" line, as they manipulate food prices. And no, not a drought in China, nor rain in Australia, explains it all.

[SoCalDem]

4. Prices have been artificially low for too many years now

When you consider how much one of the BIGGEST cost-factors has risen over the last 6 years, it's easy to see that sooner or later the prices would HAVE to reflect it.

MOST food in the US moves over the highways in big ole trucks that used to buy $0.99 a gallon diesel.. how much is that diesel now?


In every facet of grocery sales, costs have been attacked with a vengeance to keep prices lower than they should have been because cost-creep every week is an aggravation to the consumer. I guess they thought they could ride it out, but with little change on the horizon, the day of reckoning has arrived.

They have cut employees, sold off stores, maybe lowered services at stores, companies have reduced the sizes of containers (while keeping the "old" prices), they have probably even cut into the margins that the growers get..there always comes a time when there is just no more wiggle room.

So instead of a gradual rise in prices over time, we now get to swallow a BIG increase all at once .

That said, our food prices here in the US are still lower than in most other places, and we have many more options available to us.