USA asks Sweden for help in the egg crisis | Hacker News Reader

USA asks Sweden for help in the egg crisis

freshpost.substack.com

14 pointssilly_ninja17 comments

> In the USA, the egg shortage is primarily due to bird flu, which led to the culling of over 40 million birds last year.

So that's, what, roughly 10-15% of egg-laying birds across the country? It takes less than 6 months for a chick to mature to egg-laying hen.

This source[1] asserts per-capita egg consumption was already realizing proportional decline for years since 2020 peak.

The real game[2] being played has a distinct smell.

[1] https://unitedegg.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/UEP_Website...

[2] https://doi.org/10.7275/cbv0-gv07

18 weeks is the typical age for the first egg, although it does take a little longer before they're laying daily.

The market should be responding quickly to shortages. That it isn't does smell.

They are asking Denmark as well [1]…

All your eggs and Greenland are belong to us!

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/14/trump-egg-pr...

Part 1: Hatching a Conspiracy (https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/hatching-a-conspiracy-a-b...)

Part 2: How Chicken Genetics Barons Created the Egg Crisis (https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/fowl-play-how-chicken-gen...)

Part 3 hasn't been released yet, but it's a good read so far.

Are they the only people still talking to us?

Only if you give a part of Florida in return

They can take all of Florida.

Who wants part of a drug pushing retirement state. Give us California!

No tariffs?

The beauty of tariffs is that it creates a bottleneck that lets you dole out favors to certain companies and industries.

The beauty of tariffs is that it creates a bottleneck that leaves other countries disinclined to do you any favors. Everything becomes transactional and exploitive.

"In the USA, the egg shortage is primarily due to bird flu"

nope

I think this is fake news

the current shortage is not actually that great, just look at the numbers

and historically any shortage would have been quickly relieved by farmers increasing their capacity

that's where the shortage lies

the big producers deliberately constricting supply by not expanding capacity, and wielding market power to prevent others doing so

I believe there is a pending trade investigation on this point, so any 'news' about eggs should probably be taken with a pinch of salt (and pepper).

I suspect any investigation will get shut down in a hot second - either by political donations to certain key individuals or by lack of capacity to do any investigations. Or both.

While the price of eggs was a campaign point for some politicians, the current crisis puts egg on their face which can only be washed away with greenbacks.

> by not expanding capacity, and wielding market power to prevent others doing so

Why would they not expand capacity and how would they prevent others from doing so?

not expanding capacity:

because less eggs == expensier eggs == more money. If everyone wants a restricted good, then the prices goes up and the one willing to pay more gets the good. And eggs are needed in a lot of areas starting with mayonaise for the quarter pounder and ending with the breakfast in rural restaurants known from the movies :)

wielding their market power to prevent others from:

while its not meant, that they prevent the small guy's small company or your neighbours from keeping chicken from laying eggs, its an economical question. If you're a big player, one possible way is to buy amounts of chicken food for even lower prices making it expensier for small quantity buyers to produce eggs. The eggs from competition are not competative in their price, so big mayonaise producers won't buy. ... And so on..

the bigger, the cheaper, the less competition is possible for the small ones.

well explained, and there's also the issue of chicks - farmers don't generally hatch their own eggs but buy chicks, and it's easy the big companies to manipulate that supply chain, indeed I believe there are ownership and licensing deals in place that favor the big producers.

Good point. There may be deals like x percent of your stock will be buyed by us. If I'm the stock owner, i would gladly agree and reduce the price, if x is bigger for one buyer than y+z+w percentages of three buyers. I would have a guarantee to sell more of my chickens for sure at once and would reduce the uncertainty of even finding three different buyers.. but this reduces the stake holders (different sellers) in the market and the big one can dictate the prices and produce amounts at will.

Bigger is always winning.

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