Egg Prices In America

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Eggs are in everything, from mayonnaise to bread to an omelet. The average American consumes over 250 eggs per year or 80 billion eggs nationwide. Eggs contain six grams of protein and only 70 calories, making eggs an important, nutritious, and delicious part of any meal. The average price of a carton of eggs has been about $1.85 for the last 5 years, however, this past year the price has risen drastically, at some points over 120%. New laws and recent avian flu outbreaks have caused egg prices to rise leading to shortages nationwide.

This year egg prices have been on the rise, first from a new law, then from outbreaks of the flu. In January 2015, a new law in California took effect; this law prevents chicken farmers from keeping their chickens in such confined areas, and giving chickens about 60% more room to stretch their wings. California farmers, producing over 30% of American eggs, now have several new costs, including more buildings and providing extra heaters to warm the chickens because they won’t be as close together. These extra costs to the farmer have been passed …show more content…

Though normally harmless to humans if properly cooked, many countries, including China and South Korea, have decided to boycott our eggs and other poultry products. The USDA says that these embargoes on eggs are an over precaution, nevertheless, we have lost many of our major importers of our eggs, not that we had much to give anyway. Despite the rise in eggs costs, the price of chicken has stayed relatively cheap. This disease has surprisingly seemed to not target broiler chickens, or eatable chickens. One theory is because they don’t live as long as layers and therefore, have less of a chance of catching the disease. However, because of the boycott of our poultry products by different countries, supply in America has gone up making the price go down. So while your egg prices may be rising at least you can have some cheap

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