Nolan Zigler
For most of us today, chicken is a large part of our diet. We eat it at the school cafeteria, restaurants, and at the fast food juggernaut that we all love, Chick-Fil-A. Our mass consumption of chicken creates an enormous impact of the economy that is often overlooked. According to the National Chicken Council, the chicken industry provides over 1 million jobs and 197.5 billion dollars to the US economy (nationalchickencouncil.org). To understand how the chicken industry has grown to become the giant it is today, we first need to look at how it started.
First off, chicken is mostly consumed in Western countries like here in the United States. Other countries and cultures eat chicken, we in the United States just consume it on a much greater scale. This is due to various factors, the main one being health.
Back in the 1900s, beef was more a popular meat than chicken. Because of this, doctors in the 1980s started to warn Americans that red meat contains a high amount of saturated fat, which can raise the risk for heart disease. Doctors nowadays still believe this, however now the main concern with eating red meat is that it can contribute to an increased risk of colon cancer (economist.com). These doctors recommended that chicken is a much healthier substitute for beef and that Americans believed it. On the graph above, you can see that there was a noticeable incline in the consumption of chicken and a noticeable decline of beef in the 1980s.
Another reason why Americans eat so much chicken is that it is the cheapest meat you can buy. Farmers continue to get more and more meat per chicken as the years progress, due to genetic modifications. This is a benefit to consumers as more meat per chicken means the price will be low, however this is bad news for the chickens. According to Kevin O’Connor, an activist and writer for animal rights, “A modern meat chicken weighs up to three kilograms: almost double the size of a chicken from 60 years ago. And their breasts are 80 percent larger” (onegreenplanet.org). With this unnatural and rapid growth, chickens now have started to develop new health problems, such as “sudden death syndrome” (onegreenplanet.org). This drastic change in size did not happen on accident either; farmers have competed throughout the decades to get more meat per chicken and to raise their profits.
Chicken takes many steps to get from the farm to your table. First chickens have to be raised on a farm, then processed into meat, and finally shipped to grocery stores or restaurants where they are sold to hungry consumers. Due to this lengthy process, it is no surprise that chickens contribute a large amount to our economy. One thing that makes chicken unique and more profitable to raise on a farm than most other animals is that they not only produce meat, but lay eggs. The egg industry is relatively smaller compared to chicken, however it still provides about 112,470 jobs and 2.3 billion in government revenue (morningagclips.com).
When looking towards the future, the chicken industry is still projected to grow, however at a much slower rate than previous years. According to the USDA, the industry is only going to grow about 1% in 2020 from 2019 (hprovisioneronline.com). Similar to in 1980 when Americans started to eat more chicken to become healthier, I feel that more and more people are becoming vegetarians or vegans and are stopping eating meat altogether in order to improve health. “Fake meat” alternatives have also started to become more popular nowadays which could start to contribute to the decline of the chicken industry. As of now, however, the industry is growing and projected to grow for years to come.
Works Cited
Nationalchickencouncil.org, www.nationalchickencouncil.org/chicken-industry-provides-more-than-one-million-jobs-and-197-5-billion-in-economic-impact-to-us-economy-new-study/.
O'Connor, Kevin. “The Genetically Modified Chicken: How We Have Altered 'Broiler' Chickens for Profit.” One Green Planet, One Green Planet, 28 Apr. 2015, www.onegreenplanet.org/animalsandnature/the-genetically-modified-chicken-how-we-have-altered-broiler-chickens-for-profit/.
Super, Tom. “State of the Chicken Industry 2019.” The National Provisioner RSS, The National Provisioner, 24 Oct. 2019, www.provisioneronline.com/articles/108464-state-of-the-chicken-industry-2019.
“Why Westerners Eat so Much Chicken.” The Economist, The Economist Newspaper, 25 Jan. 2019, www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2019/01/25/why-westerners-eat-so-much-chicken.
I never really thought about how a single animal could make such a large impact on an economy through jobs and most especially food. I thought it was well done how you presented both the pros and cons of a steadily rising chicken industry, and why both the pros and cons were happening as they were. Very well done.
ReplyDeleteI did not realize how much the chicken industry affected the economy, or how many jobs it provides. I wonder though, with vegetarianism and veganism becoming a more popular diet, if the industry will loose money or cause people to loose their jobs? I personally think we should not be pumping so many steroids into chickens, just to get more meat from them, but when does the decision to do that become just for money or will chicken farmers ever take into account that the steroids could be bad for the humans eating the chicken?
ReplyDeleteThis is a nice topic because it brings something to attention that one would never think of. I never knew that a chicken could have such a big impact on the world
ReplyDeleteWhile I knew that chicken was definitely popular here in the US, I didn't realize that it had such an impact on our food economy. I also didn't realize that people were going as far as to genetically modify the chickens in order to create chickens with a greater amount of meat.
ReplyDeleteThis is quite insightful, as I didn't realize chicken has such a big impact on the economy. I think it is pretty cool how an animal affects our economy in such a large way, and I enjoy the way you went in depth on the topic. It is also good to think about the moral standpoint behind this, and how even though the economy in America is increased, it poses a threat to chickens that farmers grow.
ReplyDeleteThis is interesting! There definitely does seem to be a decline overall in demand for meat products, for obvious reasons. However, it seems more than ever that fast food places like Chick-Fil-A are still on the rise. Is it just that meat eaters are consuming just as much meat as before, and vegetarians were already people who wouldn't regularly eat meat before becoming vegetarians? Or is there something at play? There seems to be some intense marketing of these fast food places, especially around our area, with a Chic-Fil-A, a Starbucks, and a Panda Express going up in just the last year. Also, jobs at these places are heavily encouraged for teenagers, which introduces a massive amount of younger people to the food of these chains. There could be plenty of other reasons, but these seem to be the most obvious to me.
ReplyDeleteSeeing how one animal can effect the economy so much and especially the fast food industries is huge. With seeing how chicken has taken over the meat consumption, it would be interesting to see what food dominates next as previously it was all red meat. I really liked how you not only showed how it grew but also what is expected in the future with chicken.
ReplyDeleteI liked how you picked out one specific thing that really makes an impact on the economy. I also liked how you included facts about red meats and how farmers are genetically modifying chickens and how new health problems that are arising due to that. I also liked how you included a graph so the reader could visually see the difference.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't expecting to read about chickens today, but I'm pleasantly surprised. I know chicken is my preferred protein, but I didn't realize so many people agreed in comparison to those who prefer beef. The calculation of people with my shared interest, as you mentioned, makes a significant impact on our economy. I would never have thought of that- next Chicken Ball Friday, I'll be thinking of this post and how my lunch money is a part of your statistics.
ReplyDeleteTruth be told, I was extremely happily surprised when I realized that today I got to read about chickens, vs. something else that I normally read about. The craziest thing of all this, though, in my mind, is the fact that the chicken can affect the economy as much as it does - specifically the fast food industry. In retrospect, it makes a little bit of sense (Popeyes, Chik-Fil-A, the beloved McChicken), but when you think of items that dominate the market, chicken is typically not the first to mind.
ReplyDeleteThis is interesting because I believe this is part of a larger trend of human behavior. In general, most Americans eat a lot of meat, often too much, which is evident in the obesity crisis. Since there was such a big push away from beef, as you mentioned, people wanted to continue eating meat and chickens don’t take as much space so I think part of it is just the demand went up for meat that wasn’t beef.
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting how such a small animal can make such a large impact on the economy. When you consider the population of chickens on Earth though (23 billion) their impact seems much more reasonable. Especially with the large fast food companies on the rise the demand for more chicken is only going to increase with increased prices coming along with. We can already see this happening with Chick-Fil-A in charging $4 for a sandwich. People will likely but the sandwich regardless of price because sandwiches are relatively inelastic.
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ReplyDeleteNice topic bro. I really had no idea that something as common as chicken could have such a large impact on the economy. I really back the idea that westeners eat a lot of meat and that is partly because of culture and religion because eastern cultures don't prohibit the consumption of meat, they do limit certain days or event when eating meat is prohibited. It makes sense that chicken would have such a large impact because Chick-fil-A thrives on it and McDonald's most selling burger is the McChicken. If the chickens were to somehow disappear, it would cause a big impact in major fast-food businesses.
This topic is really interesting because it shows how impactful one food product can be on a whole economy. I can see around the same effect with dairy products too. It is really interesting that you brought up how chicken became so popular back in the 1900s due to one small belief. Along with this, the graph that you provided really helped show visually how important meat, especially chicken, is to America as a whole. Good job!
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