US beef prices have soared but farmers aren't making more money

Now is the perfect time for someone being overly dramatic to say "In the 2 years since July 2024, lumber prices have increased 47%, significantly higher than inflation".

But someone else could also say "Lumber prices are the same as July 2025 even though inflation has risen" or "Lumber prices are up just 10% in the 3 years since July 2023, lower than the rate of inflation across these 3 years".

[1] https://madisonsreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/IndexG...

It's basically, because everything else has gotten more expensive. Labor + fuel + wear and tear on equipment + raw materials.

Inflation of a single thing, will have effects on anything down stream of that thing.

And then there is the "greed" aspect, though overstated, where a company will see that costs have gone up in other sectors, so they raise their accordingly. This has been claimed, but I'm not sure how much it actually happens.

Mills did ramp back up, but it’s unclear to me if they used it as a chance to do so slowly/preserve margins. Lumber never got close to pre-pandemic levels.

Tariffs probably also play a role here. About a quarter of US lumber comes from Canada, and barbed wire is just steel with a little bit of processing.

For products with little value add there’s not anywhere for the tax to be absorbed, and no real way for domestic producers to quickly scale up, even if they wanted to.

The people who sell the barbed wire and wooden posts presumably like to be able to eat, so they need to raise their prices to be able to afford groceries, etc.

People under-estimate the cost of logistics and transport. Every inch of travel for any input, component, or the final product has to be paid; and even a wooden fencepost typically moves between at least 5 different locations before reaching retail.

Let's use wooden posts as an example:

  1. Forest. Trees are cut down into logs, and then transported to...
  2. Lumbermill. Logs are cut to size, and then transported to...
  3. Treatment plant. Without it, your fencepost won't last for every long, and then transported to...
  4. Distributor location. And then transported to...
  5. Store (e.g. Home Depot or whatever). And then you pick it up, or get it delivered to you.

Less clear? Check your tariffs.

I am seeing way more active paddocks of grazing cattle now as compared to a couple of years ago. The world is complex and there is never an expiation that can be given in a short soundbite, but the primary driver is no doubt that higher beef prices compelled more people to try and raise cattle, which resulted in them needing supplies required to raise cattle, and fences are one of those things you need to establish a secure paddock. The increase in demand for fencing supplies, without a corresponding increase in supply, necessities an increase in price.

https://youtu.be/c7gDBVmgIRA

"Four companies - Tyson, JBS, Cargill and National Beef - control around 85% of American beef processing.

That high level of market concentration has drawn accusations of price-fixing, even from President Trump.

So you might expect that those four firms are currently making huge profits from high beef prices. Yet the opposite is happening.

Tyson, the biggest of the four, reported in May that it had lost more than $500m on beef in the first half of its financial year."

What effect does this have on the person?

Poultry and even pork are about an order of magnitude more efficient.

It's interesting how long the market was wildly subsidized to hide the true cost of beef.

At the end of the day as more and more people want to consume the same products the prices for those are going to just go up.

When I see folks really hammering on price increases for products like beef or gas I can't help but think of how absolutely screwed we are in terms of addressing climate change if it involves consumer behavior.