The White House has explained months of working families’ lost income by passing the buck and accusing the meatpacking industry of “pandemic profiteering.”
The Biden Administration has also promised to crack down on price increases through antitrust measures, which former Obama-Biden economic adviser Larry Summers has decried as “science denial.”
READ: No One Buys the Bidenflation Blame Game
Here is actually what’s behind the skyrocketing cost of meat:
FACT: Meatpackers are no exception to the rising cost of labor.
- Starting wages for meat processors increased by over 50 percent.
- Before the pandemic, the average starting wage in beef plants was $14.50 an hour. Today, it’s risen to $22 an hour.
- President Biden’s generous unemployment benefits in the partisan $1.9 trillion so-called stimulus boosted inflation and crushed Main Street’s hiring efforts.
READ: Study: Biden’s Unemployment Bonus Held Back Economic Recovery
FACT: Production costs have also skyrocketed.
- Corn and soybean (which are used to make animal feed) have seen their prices increase to the highest levels in eight years.
- Fertilizer costs have also increased, with some costs growing by 210 percent in September 2021.
- Given the supply chain hurdles, labor shortages, and threat of crippling tax hikes, a historically high number of small businesses have been forced to raise their prices, which are then passed onto consumers.
FACT: Biden’s other policies are crushing meat production and won’t make things better any time soon.
- The National Pork Producers Council warns in their January economic update that “the rising prices of transportation, energy, and labor, production costs and breakeven levels will likely remain elevated in 2022.”
- President Biden’s first action in office was to kill energy jobs and make America more dependent on foreign energy.
- As Andrew Stuttaford warns in the New York Post, the Biden Administration’s “attempts to ‘improve free markets’ […] are likely to mean even higher prices to come.”
WATCH: Democrats’ Recipe for Higher Inflation
BOTTOM LINE: Attempting to pass the buck for inflation onto meatpackers is dishonest and denies reality.
Despite evidence that the Biden Administration’s policies have sabotaged our economic recovery, Democrats continue to push for policies in their next $5 trillion spending bill that will raise taxes on job creators and keep Americans from reconnecting with work – all of which will add fuel to the inflation fire.