Beef, the meat, yeah, beef has been the centerpiece of American food culture since the cattle drives of the 1860s.

Turn the Great Plains into the world's most productive grazing land, but the American hamburger, not just food, it's identity, identity.

And now you have beef prices going crazy and beef becoming like a luxury item.

Beef prices rising between 15 and 16 percent year over year.

You've got ground beef about 670 a pound steak over $12 a pound.

And there's a lot of different reasons that this is happening.

But it's where everything is intersecting.

And beef is the one that is becoming an issue for most Americans to afford.

Inflation, supply chain costs,

the ran war affecting fuel and transport.

And you also have drought in some of the cattle states.

And it's all converging all at once.

And one of the things that Americans love to eat the most, beef is becoming unaffordable.

Yeah, this is a supply issue because demand has remained pretty steady, which is strong.

Everybody likes beef in this country, and then we've always consumed a lot of it.

But like you said, fewer cattle, harsher weather, higher fuel costs, expensive feed, rising labor

costs, and then you've still

got this continued strong consumer demand. Also, too, there's a lot of, I don't want to call

them necessarily fad diets, but the popular diets of the time, whether it's carnivore or keto,

really both of those rely on a lot of protein consumption and a lot of beef consumption and a lot of beef tallow, which is something that we've heard about a lot lately in the last couple of years. So the demand continues to be strong. The supply is struggling and that's why we're seeing these higher beef prices. I think it's funny, Casey, you and I were at the grocery store not too long ago. And years ago, we used to get pork tenderloins and we would cook pork tenderloins and I kind of forgot about them and we haven't done it. I think

you're going to see people turning a lot toward those alternative, you know, protein options, whether

it's chicken, but beef tenderloin or pork tenderloin right now is a very strong alternative to beef because of the price. So much cheaper. Yeah, I mean, you can get it for three or four dollars a pound. It's a great cut of meat. It's got a great cut of meat. It's got a ton of protein in it. Really easy to cook. I think that that's where you're starting to see chicken and pork becoming a much bigger option in people's diets because beef is so darn expensive. So experts are saying that there's not going to be immediate relief expected.

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