Ground Beef Just Hit $6.10 a Pound — Here's Why Prices Are Surging
If your Fourth of July barbecue felt a little more expensive this year, you're not imagining things. Beef really is getting more expensive. Like eggs before it, the price hike results from a combination of issues all happening at once. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the price of beef has increased by more than 8% since the beginning of 2025, hitting $9.26 per pound in July. Ground beef isn't faring much better, hitting $6.10 in June, almost a dollar higher than in 2024, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And no, the price increases aren't due to tariffs. As the Associated Press reported, one of the issues is America's shrinking cattle supply, which has been decreasing for the past twenty years. It noted that as of the start of 2025, the U.S. had 86.7 million cattle and calves, the lowest number since 1951.
And that's not all. As Food & Wine reported in late 2024, a flesh-eating parasite called the New World screwworm (NWS) was found in cattle in Mexico and is spreading north. This led the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) to restrict the "importation of animal commodities originating from or transiting Mexico, effective immediately and pending further information from Mexican veterinary authorities on the size and scope of the infestation." And, as we predicted, this resulted in a significant drop in cattle imported into the United States, which already has far fewer cattle than in years past.
'It happened overnight, and in an environment where we already have tight supplies, we're going to end up in a spot where we're going to have tighter supplies," Charley Martinez from the University of Tennessee shared with Brownfield Ag News at the time. 'You have feed lot operators that are needing cattle now, and they no longer have a supplier, and they're going to have to go out to the sale barns and go look for cattle … Well, that's actually going to cause a short-run demand increase, and as demand increases, prices increase.'There is one glimmer of hope here. In early July this year, the USDA announced a new plan to breed millions of sterile flies at the Moore Air Base in Texas, just miles from the Mexico border, and release them to mate with wild female flies to prevent them from laying eggs inside cattle wounds, stopping the spread in its tracks. Then, there's climate change. The AP noted that a three-year drought, which started in 2020, dried out many pastures, leading to higher feed prices and forcing cattle ranchers to slaughter more female cattle to meet beef demand, which in turn reduced their herd sizes in subsequent years.
Related: Inflation's Cooling, but Food Prices? Not So Much
'For them, the balance is, 'Do I sell that animal now and take this record high check?' Or do I keep her to realize her returns over her productive life when she's having calves?' David Anderson, a livestock economist at Texas A&M, told the AP. 'And so it's this balancing act, and so far the side that's been winning is to sell her and get the check.'And if Trump's tariffs do come to pass, things could get even pricer. According to National Beef Wire, the majority of America's cattle imports come from Canada, which faces a 35% tariff, followed by Mexico with a 30% tariff. New Zealand and Australia both face a 10% tariff, and Brazil faces tariffs of up to 50%.As for when prices will come down again, they may have to wait for the fall, when the weather and the demand for beef cool. Typically after midyear, beef prices tend to decline,' David Anderson, a professor and extension economist for livestock and food product marketing at Texas A&M, shared with USA Today. 'Seasonally, I think there's a chance we see lower prices than where we have been in the last few weeks.'
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