How 4 companies control the beef industry

Corporate consolidation is making it impossible for cattle ranchers to stay afloat.

Cattle auctions happen every day throughout the US; they serve a crucial purpose for the cattle markets. Inside one of these auctions, like the one we profile in St. Onge, South Dakota, you can see how a competitive market functions. There are multiple producers and buyers competing for a commodity, which results in a value, or price, for that commodity.

But over the past 40 years, the meatpacking sector — made up of the companies that buy and slaughter cattle for consumption — has undergone a dramatic degree of corporate consolidation. In the 1980s, the US relaxed its approach to antitrust enforcement, one tool the government uses to rein in market concentration. Today, only four companies process 85 percent of all the cattle produced in the US.

Cattle ranchers say this is affecting their ability to compete for good prices and make a living. This is one way industrialized agriculture is making it difficult for independent farmers and ranchers to stay in business in America.

For this story, we contacted Tyson Foods, Cargill, National Beef, and JBS for comment. We only received a response from Tyson: A representative shared testimony from one of the company’s executives at a recent Senate hearing. We included that in this video, and the full transcript is below:

This is the first episode of a series we are producing with the Future Perfect team at Vox, who explore big problems and the big ideas that can tackle them. We are calling this season The Human Cost of Meat, and future episodes will explore other ways industrial meat production has transformed the lives of people who consume meat, work in the meat industry, or live next to a factory farm.

Further reading:

Future Perfect produced a podcast season on other ways Big Meat has changed our lives:

Claire Kelloway’s reporting for Vox on Big Meat:

New York Times reporting on how the pandemic revealed supply chain bottlenecks:

The CEO of R-CALF USA, Bill Bullard, was a source for this story. R-CALF is in the midst of a lawsuit against the packing industry. For the latest on their case:

[Vox]

Thanks for watching! This is the first episode of a series we are producing with the Future Perfect team at Vox, who explore big problems and the big ideas that can tackle them.

We are calling this season The Human Cost of Meat, and future episodes will explore other ways industrial meat production has transformed the lives of people who consume meat, work in the meat industry, or live next to a factory farm.

[._lovergrl]

why does this channel make me interested in things i never thought i’d be interested in

[anquelmartho]

In Brazil, milk and coffee market works the same, lots of producers and just a handful of packers. This is outsourcing at it's worse. Those packers don't run their business with much risk, if production goes down, only farmers suffer. Packers just sell less.

[auroraslattery]

As a cow calf producer I want to personally thank Vox for this video. This is a serious problem we are facing.

[LuGer]

"the illusion of choice" - that is a pretty perfect summary of what's going on today

[Krustenkaese]

its honestly impressive how many of current Americas problems can be traced back to Reagan.

[bubba]

This made me cry. It’s Very moving to me as a small rancher owner

[johnchessant]

This is real journalism. It's a shame we have so many 24-hour news networks but so little of this is going on.

[brandimcgoff]

It's hard to see such a tough guy cry. It's heartbreaking for these farmers.

[tjfm]

This is the thing that always gets me. Meat production in the US *used to* be somewhat environmentally conscious. Bigger, less concentrated farms where the animals are raised properly have a much lower impact on the environment, but farms were forced to industrialize because of the packer monopoly messing up the supply chain. Moreover if farming was done the way it used to be, there wouldn’t have been a meat shortage during the pandemic.

This is why we shouldn’t be villainizing cow farmers. We should be looking at the corporations that warped the industry.

[Thruthefiretogold]

There is a book called “Goliath” and it’s about monopolies and anti-trust laws. It shows a full time line of how America has let big companies control industries without much regulation.

[ruelarila]

It's sad how trickle-down economics often means that the costs are trickled-down but never the profits.

[bmsnider]

My family was never involved in ranching so I am the first to have always dreamed of raising cattle on my own ranch. I researched and discovered what the video reveals. An individual ranch has little chance of the U. S.
So I bought a ranch and living my dream in Uruguay. Best decision ever.

[Tustin]

At this point, Vox should just have a series called “And Then Regan Happened”, because the Regan Administration seems to be the catalyst for a TON of our problems today.

[JJs_playground]

When i was a young kid, before i understood politics or anything of the sort, I always thought Ronald Reagan was a great president. But now that I'm old enough to understand the world around me, I've realized the Reagan administration messed up a lot of policies that are still being felt 4 decades later.

[fahmitaufik]

That's the hardest, most heartfelt "Yup" I've ever heard.

[jordankindschi]

Great reporting. No agenda trying to be pushed, just clearly laying out the history and facts. Keep it up.

[brunokallasfs]

Less government doesn’t always mean more freedom. Sometimes government regulations are necessary in order to preserve freedom.

[willungs]

My hometown of Dubuque, Iowa was hit really hard by the consolidation of the meat packing industry. At one point in the early 80s, we had the highest unemployment rate out of any city in the country (about 25%). 40 years later, the city is still struggling to come back.

Thank you for sharing this video.

[ydid]

do this same thing for media companies and banks and lobbying companies