Those of you who have known me, or read my writing, know that, like Alice, I’ve been known to stumble down a rabbit hole or two. In fact, I even look for rabbit holes, and occasionally create them….
How fortunate that I stumbled across this one. 😊 I happened to be in a Barnes & Nobel Bookstore in November and found an interesting book in the Used Books section. I just started reading it a few days ago and have already found a trove of interesting information. Some might call it rabbit holes.
The book is “Tastes like Chicken” by Emelyn Rude. ( Source ) I can’t say enough good things about this book already, and I’m only on page 84! A lot of information, and THOROUGHLY researched. I will no doubt be using additional information from it in future Blogs, but I couldn’t wait on this subject: Egg prices.
It turns out that eggs have been a VERY hot commodity in our country’s past. During the Forty-Niner Gold Rush, a single egg could cost upwards of $1.00 EACH. Yes, you read correctly, EACH.
Now in 2023 dollars, that equals $38.55 EACH, or $462.60 per dozen. (SOURCE ) Suddenly $5 or $6 per dozen or even $10 per dozen prices today doesn’t sound so bad, does it?
In fact, taking inflation into account is something routinely missed when looking at historical prices for anything. Currently that includes eggs. Here’s egg prices from 1980 to 2022:
(SOURCE )
I converted just 3 of the average price on the chart to give you an idea of the effect of inflation using this calculator (SOURCE) :
1980 From $0.84 to $3.03
2015 From $2.47 to $3.09
2022 From $2.86 to $2.86
If you really want to dig into it, you can download the data from the link, and notice the fluctuations of prices within each year. For instance, prices are almost always higher in the winter months, and lower in the summer months each year.
Not that I’m defending these prices. Far from it. The egg “shortage” is most likely yet another example of Big Corporate mismanagement, market manipulation, and greed.
We should continue to complain about the drastic price increases.
Just know it’s been worse in the past. Much worse. So bad that the only people that could get them were ultra-rich. In today’s world, the 1 percenters. We can’t have that again. People’s health and lives depend on it.
Eggs are one of the most nutritious single source foods on the planet.
Man, can literally live on eggs alone, and we need the prices to be affordable to everyone.
In the meantime, stop buying all processed foods that contain eggs.
That will make more eggs available for the open market, reduce the open market price, and improve your health.
Win-win!
Great advice!