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American Cheese Surplus Reaches Record High
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, there's a 1.4 billion-pound cheese surplus. "The glut, which at 900,000 cubic yards is the largest in U.S. history, means that there is enough cheese sitting in cold storage to wrap around the U.S. Capitol," reports NPR. Americans managed to consume nearly 37 pounds per capita in 2017, but that wasn't enough to reduce the surplus. From the report: The stockpile started to build several years ago, in large part because the pace of milk production began to exceed the rates of consumption, says Andrew Novakovic, professor of agricultural economics at Cornell University. Over the past 10 years, milk production has increased by 13 percent because of high prices. But what dairy farmers failed to realize was that Americans are drinking less milk. According to data from the USDA, Americans drank just 149 pounds of milk per capita in 2017, down from 247 pounds in 1975.
Suppliers turn that extra milk into cheese because it is less perishable and stays fresh for longer periods. But Americans are turning their noses up at those processed cheese slices and string cheese -- varieties that are a main driver of the U.S. cheese market -- in favor of more refined options, Novakovic tells Here & Now's Jeremy Hobson. Despite this shift, sales of mozzarella cheese, the single largest type of cheese produced and consumed in the U.S., remain strong, he says. Novakovic also notes that imported cheeses tend to cost more, so when people choose those, they buy less cheese overall. The growing surplus of American-made cheese and milk means that prices are declining. The current average price of whole milk is $15.12 per 100 pounds, which is much lower than the price required for dairy farmers to break even.
Suppliers turn that extra milk into cheese because it is less perishable and stays fresh for longer periods. But Americans are turning their noses up at those processed cheese slices and string cheese -- varieties that are a main driver of the U.S. cheese market -- in favor of more refined options, Novakovic tells Here & Now's Jeremy Hobson. Despite this shift, sales of mozzarella cheese, the single largest type of cheese produced and consumed in the U.S., remain strong, he says. Novakovic also notes that imported cheeses tend to cost more, so when people choose those, they buy less cheese overall. The growing surplus of American-made cheese and milk means that prices are declining. The current average price of whole milk is $15.12 per 100 pounds, which is much lower than the price required for dairy farmers to break even.
If an industry consistently produces more than consumers demand and has prices below break even, the normal market response would be for some of the producers to go out of business. The only reason they don't is because of government subsidies. There's no good reason for the government to constantly exempt farmers from the normal law of supply and demand.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
I love cheese, fancy or not. But it's expensive. Quit hoarding, lower the price, and I'll eat it! Dairy product boom and bust is nothing new in the U.S. When I was a kid, dairy was like some kind of strategic item, with practically a command economy, government subsidies always coming and going. Our neighbor (farmer) got in and out of the dairy business every few years, following the subsidies. In fat (ha ha) years, the government was giving the stuff away.
Strange things are afoot at the Circle-K.
is for baby cows.
Moooo!
I love cheese! Just not a million pounds of it. No Whey...
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Yeah, this sounds like a great idea. We can use it to build a wall around Washington, D.C. I'm pretty sure Mexico will gladly pay for it.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
"The glut, which at 900,000 cubic yards is the largest in U.S. history, means that there is enough cheese sitting in cold storage to wrap around the U.S. Capitol,"
Awesome! The artist Christo merely wrapped the German Parliament in cloth. Wrapping the US Capitol in cheese would absolutely top that!
Now, if we also have a surplus of bacon . . . we could also wrap it in that, and fry that bastard, and have lunch for the rest of the year!
The beauty of this situation is that the pork is already on the inside.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
is for baby cows.
Moooo!
I love cheese! Just not a million pounds of it. No Whey...
I Gouda hand it to you. Feta love of God, that's so funny, I Camembert it. Emmental for cheese jokes -- I just Edam up.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
Farmers don't make the cheese. They raise cows that produce milk.
There's no good reason for the government to constantly exempt farmers from the normal law of supply and demand.
There is a reason, and it's a damn good one: To regulate supply and stabilize pricing.
Think about it: have you ever had to worry about food, really, really worry about it? A moderate price increase due to increasing oil prices at the turn of the century is the closest our country has ever come to a "food crisis". There has never been a serious food shortage or price inflation for food in the US for as long as I've been alive.
It used to not be that way. You can go back to the 70s, and read about how rapidly fluctuating food prices created quite a political stir, as evidenced by the April 1973 cover of Time Magazine. If you study the data on this page, you can see both how food prices (particularly beef) stabilized after 1980, and how the average worker has seen a steady increase over time in the amount of food that can be purchased with their wages.
That has been the primary purpose of the US Farm Bill: to encourage, subsidize, and regulate the food market, stabilizing pricing and providing ample food supply. Because when there's oversupply, people complain about food going to waste. When there's a lack of supply, people riot and governments collapse. Which would you really prefer?
Last night, I was wondering what exactly "American cheese" is.
It's this tasteless, rubbery gunk that, in some cases, looks pretty close to cheese.
It's really weird stuff, when I lived in the US I initially bought generic cheese (i.e. went for the most average product because their cheese looks weird and I wanted to go for the safest option), and it was tasteless rubbery gunk. So I bought stronger cheese, and it was tasteless rubbery gunk. Then I bought extra strong, mature, whatever cheese, and it was still tasteless rubbery gunk. A few months later I was on a plane stuck on the tarmac due to snow and chatting to the guy next to me, who was a cheese importer. He said business was tough, because it was hard to sell cheese with any flavour when most people went for the most bland gunk there was. So there were twenty different types of cheese in the supermarket, but all were the same bland gunk, because that's what sold.
It's really a stupid measurement. The reference standard is how many times the cheese can wrap around the Library of Congress. Everybody knows that.
My God, it's Full of Source!
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The label says "pasteurized process cheese food".
You're being too generous. IIRC, it's "pasteurized processed cheese food product". I don't know how a food is different from a food product and I'm pretty happy that way. I'll just stay away from the nasty stuff.
(Well, except I have a recipe for a Velveeta-based chili cheese dip. It's appalling but really tasty after a few beers.)
Clearly, we need to make America Grate again.
"Cats like plain crisps"
There's something worse: American "chocolate". I first thought the sample I tried is badly spoiled -- it tasted like vomit. Turns out, US manufacturers intentionally add butyric acid (which is a good part of what makes vomit smell) because it was what "consumers demand".
Early on, chocolate production in the US was done with exceptionally bad hygiene and poor process, resulting in a product that was spoiled and in any civilised setting would be thrown out. Yet like that cheese gunk, companies instead make people think this is what chocolate tastes like.
Being able to legally call a product with no cocoa at all "chocolate" doesn't help, either.
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.