OPINION
Blue Mountain Eagle
A4
Wednesday, January 19, 2022
OUR VIEW
Beef price
solution uses
magical math
resident Biden wants to help beef producers get better prices for
their cattle, while at the same time he wants to help consumers get
a break on high beef prices at the grocery store.
P
The culprits on both ends of the transaction, according to Biden, are the
four big meatpackers that control 80% of the market.
Beef producers, pressed by drought to reduce herds, pushed up supply,
pushing down live cattle prices. At the same time, processors say they are
struggling to keep plants operating at capacity because of COVID regu-
lations and worker illness. Additionally, distributors are having diffi culty
getting product to retailers because of a shortage of warehousing and truck-
ing. As a result, the price of retail beef has gone up because supply is below
demand.
Their troubles aside, processors are in a bit of an economic sweet spot
at the moment, and in the president’s sights.
“In too many industries, a handful of giant companies dominate the
market,” Biden said in a virtual press conference last week.
“And too often they use their power to squeeze out smaller competitors
and stifl e new entrepreneurs, making our economy less dynamic and giv-
ing themselves free rein to raise prices, reduce options for consumers or
exploit workers,” he said.
The meat industry is a “textbook example,” he said.
Biden’s solution is to put up $1 billion to expand independent pro-
cessing capacity, strengthen rules that protect producers and consumers,
promote vigorous and fair enforcement of existing competition laws and
increase transparency in cattle markets.
Problem solved? Probably not. Certainly not in the immediate future.
We support expanding processing capacity that caters to smaller pro-
ducers, but the economics of the meatpacking business don’t favor a dozen
or so new large, independent packing plants competing for the big retail
markets.
Getting these plants sited, permitted and built will take years. Assum-
ing that happens, any positive impact they could conceivably have on
increasing producer prices and reducing consumer prices would be far in
the future.
Economists who have commented on the plan are skeptical. It is unclear
if the capacity of these yet-to-be-built plants will be signifi cant enough to
sway the markets on either side of the packinghouse door to increase pro-
ducer prices and lower retail prices.
And consumers have to ask if it’s possible for meatpackers to pay
more for cattle and at the same time drop the price on the retail side. That
sounds like something the established players could weather longer than
the startups.
We agree that there should be more competition, and that existing anti-
trust rules should be enforced. We also think producers need more price
transparency.
Nothing that the president suggested will cause retail prices to fall any-
time soon, if ever. Nor will they help livestock producers in the short run.
But the president’s announcement did help shift focus from other uncom-
fortable headlines.
Easy answers depend on a lot of magical thinking, and short memories.
COMMENTARY
Holding hope for radical change
T
he new year has begun with
melancholy, as our country
sees the pandemic reach new
heights. Meanwhile our crises of cli-
mate, democracy, and inequality
seem more entrenched than ever.
All this uncertainty is taking a
toll, but uncertain times are far from
unprecedented. Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr. spoke to an equally uncer-
tain time and found hope in rec-
ognizing the necessity of radical
change.
As we celebrate the national hol-
iday dedicated to King, I always
encourage people to take some time
to look at his writings — and I espe-
cially do this year. In moments like
these, I like to revisit one of King’s
last essays, “A Testament of Hope,”
which sounds as relevant today as
the day he wrote it.
“Whenever I am asked my opin-
ion of the current state, I am forced
to pause,” King wrote. “It is not
easy to describe a crisis so profound
that it has caused the most power-
ful nation in the world to stagger in
confusion and bewilderment.”
Sound familiar?
“Today’s problems are so acute
because the tragic evasions and
defaults of several centuries have
accumulated to disaster propor-
tions,” King continued. These inter-
related problems, he continued, have
“now merged into a social crisis of
almost stupefying complexity.”
King specifi cally named “war,
infl ation, urban decay, white back-
lash, and a climate of violence”
alongside “race relations and pov-
erty” as the cascading crises of his
day. To that list we could add the
pandemic and climate crisis today.
come when further evasion of social
responsibility in a turbulent world
will court disaster and death,” he
said. “America has not yet changed
because so many think it need not
change, but this is the illusion of the
damned.”
Although King knew that change
wouldn’t be easy, he was actually
hopeful about it.
“Humanity has the capacity to
do right as well as wrong,” King
affi rmed. “The past is strewn with
the ruins of the empires of tyranny,
and each is a monument not merely
to our blunders but to our capacity
to overcome them… That’s why I
remain an optimist, though I am also
a realist, about the barriers before
us.”
King’s “Testament of Hope” is
based on a realist’s assessment of
the need for political, economic, and
moral change. King is clear-eyed
that America must embrace radical
change — which won’t come from
the powerful but from the “naïve
and unsophisticated.”
Hope in radical change, for many
of us, seems out of place during
this time of tension. Yet there has
been incredible change over the last
few years. Rather than return to our
dysfunctional past, King’s “Testa-
ment of Hope” points to the need to
embrace and advance that change.
As we begin 2022 I fi nd this
message as important as ever.
Dedrick Asante-Muhammad is
the chief of race, wealth, and com-
munity at the National Community
Reinvestment Coalition and an asso-
ciate fellow of the Institute for Pol-
icy Studies. This op-ed was distrib-
uted by OtherWords.org.
Even more than
half a century ago,
King believed
that the time for
small, incremen-
tal changes had
passed. “The lux-
Dedrick
ury of a leisurely
Asante-
approach to urgent
Muhammad
solutions — the
ease of gradual-
ism — was forfeited by ignoring the
issues for too long,” he wrote.
“When millions of people have
been cheated for centuries, resti-
tution is a costly process. Inferior
education, poor housing, unem-
ployment, inadequate health care
— each will require billions to cor-
rect,” King warned. “Justice so long
deferred has accumulated interest
and its cost for this society will be
substantial in fi nancial as well as
human terms.”
But for a country weighed down
by segregation, inequality, and the
Vietnam War, King also knew that
the costs of injustice were greater —
something that feels even more true
today.
“If we look honestly at the real-
ities of our national life, it is clear
that we are not marching for-
ward,” he wrote. “We are groping
and stumbling; we are divided and
confused.”
In the face of these “deeply
rooted evils” and “systemic rather
than superfi cial fl aws,” King off ered
a remedy: the “radical reconstruc-
tion of society itself” — and praised
the dissenters who called for it,
often at great cost.
“Today’s dissenter tells the com-
placent majority that the time has
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Let’s draw together
in the new year
To the editor:
Many use this month to refl ect
on what we went through in 2021.
For many, and certainly me, it was a
time of trials and transition, not only
for our nation, but for families.
I tried to keep my spirit in a
“thanksgiving” mode. We may be
all going through this new wilder-
ness journey, but God has been
along with me, for every step. It
was the thing that kept me moving
forward, and I pray all that read
this can attest to their own life as
being so blessed.
My true friends also stayed close,
and cried when I cried and laughed
when I laughed. A word, a hug, an “I
love you” helped keep me centered
in what was important.
Despite a nation in crisis, let’s
all draw together, as Grant County
people tend to do, and look forward
to the new year with gratitude for
God’s favors. Welcome new begin-
nings, and be blessed to know we
are all called the children of God.
Show me, Lord, where you want
me to go, what you want me to do to
be a blessing to others, and give you
all the glory. Amen.
Mya Ennis
John Day
L
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SALEM
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503-378-3111. Fax: 503-378-6827. Website: governor.state.or.us/
governor.html.
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fi ndley. Email: sen.lynnfi ndley@oregonlegislature.gov.
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Salem 97301. Phone: 503-986-1460. District address: 258 S.
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Website: oregonlegislature.gov/fi ndley. Email: rep.markowens@
oregonlegislature.gov.
WASHINGTON, D.C.
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Washington D.C. 20510. Phone: 202-224-5244. Email: wayne_
kinney@wyden.senate.gov. Website: http://wyden.senate.gov
Fax: 202-228-2717.
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