Egg prices rising as California chicken law takes effect

January 2, 2015

chickenHSUS-350Chicken egg prices are expected to rise across the U.S. early in 2015, following the implementation of a California law requiring farmers to house hens in cages with enough space to move around and stretch their wings. [CBS Sacramento]

In 2008, California voters passed Proposition 2, which requires larger enclosures for egg-laying hens. California farmers then feared they would suffer a competitive disadvantage, so in 2012, the Legislature passed a bill applying the regulation to out-of-state farmers who sell eggs in the state.

California is one of the nation’s largest egg consumers. The state also imports about one third of its supply of eggs.

The new law, which took effect Wednesday, is requiring farmers to place fewer hens in each cage or to invest in revamped henhouses. Farmers are then passing along the expenses to consumers.

Egg prices will rise 10 to 40 percent, UC Davis economist Dan Sumner said.

Prior to the law taking effect, six major egg-producing states sued California, claiming the state was violating the Commerce Clause of the Constitution by dictating market prices elsewhere. California appealed in the lawsuits, then other states appealed. The appellate process is ongoing.


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The hell with allowing more room for chickens to roam, we should smash them together as close as possible to save money. As all true Christians realize, we have dominion over all animals and can do what we want with them!


Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” (Genesis 1:26)


I have a great answer: Stop eating eggs. Check this out: http://nutritionfacts.org/video/eggs-and-diabetes/ It amazes me that people continue to eat eggs at the rate they do. They are nothing more than a poison for the body. Do the research and figure it out. Oh, by the way, skip the studies that were paid for by the egg industry. They are so biased (and untrue), they are a joke.


Chickens. An animal created by God given special treatment. No soul, no spirit. Not surprising in todays post modernistic age.


Babies. Created in the image of God. Body, Soul, Spirit. Sentenced to death by abortion if not wanted. Human sanctioned murder. Not surprising in this post modernistic age.


God will not be mocked.


Romans 1:25 (NKJV): who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.


My footnote: Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and The Life.


AntiChrists….Get ready for things known to be radically changed. The Rapture of the Bride of Christ “The Church” is soon to come. Then, 7 terrible years of the wrath of God being poured out upon those left behind for their unbelief.


Only that God will fulfill His Covenant with His beloved Israel, will it come to an end. Then, the 1,000 millenial rein of Jesus Christ! From Jeruselem.


Gee, THIHB, all you did was summarize some points from the Christian bible, and your thumbs downs are running way more than thumbs up. I don’t know if that is a popularity rating against you, or an accuracy rating against you, but since your summary was an apt one, I guess you’re thumbs downed for popularity of your forecast.


Either way, looks like a bunch of post-Christian-USA-era thinkers have been rating your post. Oh well. I think your bible also forecasts that the remaining public (after a rapture or disappearance event) won’t be much moved by the disappearance of the Christian believer folk, i.e. won’t notice or be motivated by that disappearance.


I have this pet theory that the Discovery Channel would run physicist Michio Kaku explaining that they’d been zapped out to a higher dimensional plane. Of course, it sometimes sounds like I work out the details of my pet theories whilst under the influence of Jack Daniels, so there’s no accounting for them either.


In any event, my ramblings aside, your post did bring up the very real and very poignant difference in the treatment of poultry versus human fetal tissue. An interesting and valid post you made. Thumbs up from me, anyway.


Soon the new cap & trade carbon tax will raise the price even more. I hope I can afford to continue to live in this most perfect state.


1. Get some chickens of your own.


2. Don’t eat eggs.


3. Move to North Dakota where you can have all the chickens and eat all the eggs you want, and where the weather is fine for about a week ( cumulatively ).


Yea the typical stupid answer of, if you don’t like it……….blah, blah, blah. Well let me tell you. I was born in this state and it WASN’T all this crap till recent years. It was fine. So your answer is asinine.


Funny how you also always rag on big business and their profit margin’s and yet here is the same (yes we know the reason) but still it is that evil big business you oh so regularly carp on.


Gosh, what an intelligent reply.

I frankly don’t know how to answer.


Of course you can’t reply. Don’t want to confuse you with the truth.


The left never does know how to reply to facts….

It’s why they lost the Senate in November and more seats in the House….Cha…CHING…..


It isn’t a case of things being either “big business is all bad” or “big business is fine the way it is.” There should be some sort of balance where they don’t take all the money and run, leaving the little guy who actually PAYS his taxes holding the bag to fund necessary things to keep a country functioning, while their money is safe offshore someplace. There is a middle ground. They just don’t want you to see it that way, they want to keep you thinking it’s about “freedom.”


Well said. We need more people who can view the propaganda from both sides with a proper degree of skepticism.


But here in lays the problem. It is called reality. We had companies on shore for YEARS!! They paid their taxes and it was a something is better than nothing. Then we said let’s get this extra and pin it on big business. WTF are they gonna do about it? They have to pay. Well they moved offshore and WE paid. So you tell me, which is better. To have something, that while small, will add up with the many different business paying or to have what we have now. NOTHING!!


Or look at it this way, you go shopping and go looking for a deal to …………..save money. Well what do you think a business does? I do that in my business. Why would any sane person pay more if they don’t have to? And save me the easy answer of morals. Yes it is the moral thing to do but this is big business. Don’t put them in the position in the first place to go looking.


I’m not sure how moving offshore made us pay. We are still paying the same low prices for stuff that now comes from China. Hiring children like we used to do in the 1800s and early 1900s has kept these goods cheap. Using your reasoning, we should we have kept our children working in factories and out of school to keep stuff cheaper and to keep corporations onshore.


Personally, I think it is just today’s business ethics at some large corporations, or the lack thereof, that has caused the problems.


The ‘big-businesses’ that you extoll were ‘looking’ long before you knew it.


Heck, first it was the East India Corporation that got tax breaks from King George that would have busted the smaller competition in the Colonies that set up the Revolution.

Slavery, of course, was just ‘acceptable business practices’ in the Old South.

Then, the Robber Barons had their sweatshops, child labor, and monopolies that kept working people in subjection.


You want things better for YOU, as a diligent and honest businessperson ?


Then re-institute TARIFFS, anti-trust laws, fair and equitable taxation, and reject phony ‘race-to-the-bottom’ free trade agreements that steal from all of us.


The only way IMHO to get to fair and equitable taxation is a use flat tax. Pay for the goods you buy instead of income tax. That is about the only way to get to an equatable solution.


A VAT tax, like most of the democratic-socialist European nations could be part of the solution.

Taxing consumption, as Veblen proposed.


What to do with all of the ultra-rich that only can consume so much, not much more than you or I ?

They would continue to concentrate wealth, remove it into fortresses, or waste on super risky ‘investments’ that crash the entire economy ( like they did before the Great Depression of 1929 and the Great Bailout of 2008 ).


I appreciate your consideration.


Yea slow, I don’t think we are as far apart as it may seem. We both are tired of cheats but I am also tired of being penalized in taxes on gas, food etc. which we all pay.


Would love to see a way for companies to make a fair profit and end users not wanting the world from them (or to pay for all their wants) and find balance.


Oh and on lobbyists? I am NOT a fan and agree they screw up the whole system.


Mr Fair and Balanced….

Here’s a little Economics 101 for you. Businesses DON’T PAY TAXES….they never have and Never will. Their Customers Pay the Taxes in the form of higher prices. Look, I run a business, if my taxes go up 10% I raise my prices 11% to cover it. If they drop 10% then I am forced to lower my prices because I want to sell and compete with the other guy.


There is no such thing as a Business paying Taxes….the sooner you leftists realize that….the sooner the Obama Economy train wreak of only the Rich getting Richer can be fixed.


how do you explain Eisenhower’s remarkable economic success? highest taxes ever.


President Dwight Eisenhower, on Nov. 8, 1954:


“Should any political party attempt to abolish Social Security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our history.

There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes that you can do these things. Among them are H.L. Hunt ( you possible know his background ), a few other Texas oil millionaires, and an occaisional politician or business man from other states. Their number is negligible and they are stupid, ”


Today, Eisenhower would be drummed out of the Republican party for saying or even thinking that.


Eisenhower wrote those words in a letter to his brother Edgar, Dwight Eisenhower would have never said that publicly in a speech. interesting one used to be able to link to that letter at the Eisenhower library archives but no longer they changed that website it’s republican-controlled you know.


How about you ask the greedy stock-holder to take a few cents less profit?


Nah, that ain’t gonna happen is it.


They get richer while the rest of us get poorer. Well, the animals made out like bandits anyway, enough room to stretch before we kill ’em. (Geez, is that fair!?)


You sound like a guy who hasn’t achieved much in life if you are worried about a few cents an egg. When all the corporations are put out of business byt the likes of you and your ilk, where will the taxes come from. To finance your precious government. You need to think twice about what you complain about.


Why would corporation go out of business if they paid 1% more taxes?


It’s so elementary, I don’t know why it keeps coming up in these forums. If the “corporations” pay more taxes, who do you think will eventually foot that bill for them? I am , by no means, any supporter of “corporate America” and how their cronyism with the government has screwed us all over. I’m just saying that us little folks will get held holding the bill once more, for more government and the cycle continues. The answer isn’t more taxes.


How about less taxes ?


Now that the SCOTUS has ruled that “Corporations are people, my friend” in their Citizens United ruling, why not eliminate Corporate Taxes and have them subject to the same rates as the rest of us ‘individuals’ …people, have to pay ?

Then, if their ‘income’ ( profit ) exceeds $1,000,000 a year, they would have to pay 35% like a human being has to…instead of the 13% average that corporations pay now.

Same with Capital Gains taxes…put all income in the same pool subject to the same rates.


Double taxation. Those corporations are people, indeed. Millions of tax paying people that own those corporations.


That begs the question.


IF, the corporations returned excess profits to their shareholders in increased dividends or other rewards, thne it could be argued that the monies are taxed twice.


But, they don’t do that.

No. They give THEMSELVES, the CEO’s and executives bonuses of stock options ( generally at extremely reduced bases ) and outright stock gifts.

Get this: those perks are not taxed as ordinary income at all, but as capital gains …and only when the stock is sold.

So , instead of being taxed at 35%, the most they pay is 15%.

It used to be against the law for them to do this.


This is the impetus for the “Buffett Rule”.


Regarding your comment about a VAT, ask the citizens of BC, Canada how much they like the the implementation of the HST (Harmonized Sales Tax) in 2010. It was a VAT that outraged the taxpayers who already pay far more than their American neighbors. As a result, the held a referendum and successfully ended the tax in less than 2 years. Keep in mind this is a socialist/democracy saying NO to more taxes.


Like the greedy teachers and other public pension stockholders? Those greedy stockholders? Or, just the non-elite regular greedy families investing for retirement?


Please provide the name of one ‘greedy teacher’ ( not college administrator or professor ) that makes more than a CDF firefighter.


How about those hedge fund guys? How about those guys who keep their money offshore?


It’s not fair, it’s not fair…waaaa waaa waaa!


like prince andy’s bugger buddy Jeffry epstein pallin round providing under age entertainment for his clients.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-30664060


This is your government…this is your government on drugs…..


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FtNm9CgA6U


Any questions?


could I have some julienne fries and grilled peppers with that please?


Organic? Or non-organic?


I think some brains are scrambled without any participation by government at all.


Do you ?


When I read your comments….definitely!


It isn’t easy to scramble a hard-boiled egg and his egg is definitely set hard.


So sorry that my posts have that effect on you.

Try thinking of something else.


Which came first: the chicken, the egg, or idiot Americans ?


Some humans ain’t human some people ain’t kind.

They’ll lie through their teeth with their head up their behind.

You open up their hearts and here’s what you’ll find

Some humans ain’t human some people ain’t kind.


John Prine


“Which came first: the chicken, the egg, or idiot Americans?”


God came first. The I AM. From the beginning. No End.


Then, He created all things. Man, Woman, all things that exist.


Your Mother and Father came from Him. Your heritage.


Then you came into the world. [Lucky for you, your Mother did not accept Abortion as a an answer to a mistake].


To quote you; “Some humans ain’t human some people ain’t kind.

They’ll lie through their teeth with their head up their behind.

You open up their hearts and here’s what you’ll find

Some humans ain’t human some people ain’t kind.”


Now we who are free, honest, moral, enlightened souls from on high must suffer the destruction of all that is good .


The parable of the Wheat and the Tares.


Ya…make those evil Corporate Big Farms pay….

Hey wait a minute….you mean the costs of regulations get passed on to the poor single mother just trying to get buy and feed her kids a healthy breakfast in the morning? This is outrageous…I say pass a law so that the evil Corporations can’t pass the cost of regulations along. This just isn’t fair! But then again the Laws of Economics don’t care about fairness or good intensions now do they!


Your 3 egg omlet just went up in price and you have the California voters to blame who were playing Chicken with my food budget money!


Yep business doesn’t pay for increased costs or taxes but a LOT of people just don’t get it, till we hear them whine about gas prices and food costs or housing costs and don’t realize all the laws they signed off on that they thought somebody else would pay, all lands in their moronic lap.


It’s the phony ‘law of efficient markets’ crap that the Right considers a religion that has the people bamboozled.

The ultra rich lords keep spewing this nonsense so that the lower classes continue to be confused and carry their water and everything else and be in perpetual bondage.


Well, your at least half right here — the “law of efficient markets” stuff may not be total crap but is certainly not the immutable rule that the believers on the Right claim.


The problem with theories that work in some, but not all, cases is that those who benefit from them can selectively emphasize the cases that work to convince the less skeptical and informed that they have the “Truth.” That is convenient because people are either too busy or too intellectually lazy to do the thorough research needed to reach a close approximation of real truth. It is an easy way out to accept conclusions based on flimsy evidence from people who have an agreeable point of view.


The problem with these economic theories …and that’s all they are, is that they work only in very small numbers; when the group is around 200.

Not only is it more controllable then, it is more transparent.


So much is assumed as to the basic honesty of all involved. When practically everyone knows everybody else, those that are liars and cheats are soon discovered … and avoided by the collective.

Capitalism, Libertarianism, communism, ….any utopian construct does not work as proposed when there are individuals and gangs that operate outside of the ‘rules’ and game the system.


Yes there are people that don’t play by the rules. It is life. We all think we live in some Disney utopian bullshit, when the reality is there will always be cheaters to some degree. In my opinion it is better to get something than nothing at all. I.e. better to tax a little and a company may absorb, than tax large and it get’s passed on.


Think about it. If a business like these egg business, have to increase the pens and keep the same amount of chickens, they will have to increase their square footage. Square footage = more building. Well that is a cost of doing BUSINESS!


Why do you think you don’t pay the same price now for things as in the 50’s?? Pay goes up, costs go up and it all equals inflation. Oh and if that doesn’t work for you try deflation? Ask Japan how that has worked out for them.


The reason for inflation is the debasement of the currency.

That’s due to the financiers, banksters, and economic nihilists that artificially keep the costs of labor low.


Guess who pays the highest ‘marginal’ taxes ? It’s the lower and working classes as ‘individuals’ that can’t afford high-priced lobbyists and accountants to game the system in their favor.


All of you ‘rugged individualists’ and independent businesspersons have been getting screwed for decades by the ultra-rich overlords and puppetmasters, and you end up blaming each other or those of lesser means and vulnerable for your plight.


Do you find yourself a bit conflicted when it comes to hitting the keys on a product born of capitalism, and no doubt manufactured by some “ultra rich overlords” who just happened to design,and manufacture the very operating system that allows you express your opinion?

Oh, and this capitalist website that sells business sponsor space as a means of profit and support…and you not conflicted by choosing it as a place to voice you opposition to pretty much everything American?

Over 400,000 men and women of the greatest generation gave their lives so you could have the freedom to express your opinion…never lose track of that fact.


This is classic.

Regulation passes.

Price goes up.

We point it out.

Then get attacked for pointing out the Facts by SlowerFaster and his ilk.


Let him pay more for eggs and blame it on the evil Rich Lords….when it was his vote that caused it….classic Leftist mindset of being a victim, not the cause.


Regulation passes.

Corporate and factory farms that could fully absorb the costs PLAY the victim, and use it to justify price hikes.

Price goes up, they sell less, but rake in the same amount.

Less work/investment for the fat cats = same or more profit.


I’m not a victim. I can eat something else besides eggs.

Maybe you should, too.