Latest news with #EggGate
Hindustan Times
13-05-2025
- Business
- Hindustan Times
Donald Trump wasn't entirely lying about egg prices. CPI report shows massive drop
President Donald Trump's claims about dropping egg prices might not have been completely misleading. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) report published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics showed a massive decline in egg prices in April, at a whopping 12.7%. This is the biggest monthly decline since 1984. Not just April, egg prices continue to fall this month, too. The USDA recently reported that a dozen large white-shell eggs now cost $3.30 on average, down by 69 cents a fortnight ago. The CPI report comes after five months of a surge in egg prices, because of the avian flu epidemic that necessitated the mass killing of hens. However, egg prices are still higher now than before the flu outbreak. But experts believe the worst of 'EggGate' has passed. Read More: April CPI report: What's exactly in the latest inflation report - explaining key numbers 'Maybe the worst of EggGate has passed,' Tyler Schipper, associate professor in economics and data analysis at the University of St Thomas in St. Paul, told CNN. Only earlier this month, Trump claimed that grocery and gas prices are falling. "We're only in a TRANSITION STAGE, just getting started!!!" he posted on Truth Social. Back then, economists told ABC News that his claims were misleading. Last month, the president reacted to egg prices while speaking at a presser after Dr Mehmet Oz was sworn in as the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. 'You can have all the eggs you want. We have too many eggs. In fact, if anything, the prices are getting too low. So I just want to let you know that the prices are down,' Trump said. Bird flu has killed more than 169 million birds since early 2022. Any time a bird gets sick, the entire flock is killed to help keep bird flu from spreading. Once a flock is slaughtered, it can take as long as a year to clean a farm and raise new birds to egg-laying age. (With AP inputs)
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Trump's egg price fiction has suddenly become reality
For months, President Donald Trump has falsely claimed that egg prices are tumbling. It wasn't true then, but it's true now. Egg prices fell 12.7% last month, the biggest monthly decline since 1984, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Tuesday. And they could continue to fall this month, too: The USDA reported last week that a dozen large white-shell eggs now cost $3.30 on average, down a whopping 69 cents from a week before. It's a remarkable reversal after egg prices surged in each of the past five months – and 17 of the past 19 months – because of a deadly avian flu epidemic that necessitated the mass culling of egg-laying hens. 'Maybe the worst of EggGate has passed,' Tyler Schipper, associate professor in economics and data analysis at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, told CNN. Nevertheless, egg prices remain significantly higher now than before the latest bird flu outbreak, and they cost 49.3% more last month than they did a year earlier. Eggs are still more expensive than when Trump took office, according to the BLS. Egg prices this past Easter, which typically rise in the run-up to the holiday, were the highest for any Easter on record, the USDA reported. Well before last month's decline, Trump had been touting falling egg prices as a sign that his administration's plan to lower prices for consumers has been working. In February, the USDA announced an initiative to lower egg prices, including increased biosecurity on egg-laying farms, aid to farmers who have lost flocks and temporary lifting of restrictions on egg imports. Despite Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins' far more conservative estimate that egg prices would normalize in the summer, Trump last month said, 'as you know, the cost of eggs has come down like 93, 94% since we took office.' Those percentage declines Trump stated are not close to accurate – but we now know that consumer egg prices were, indeed, falling sharply when Trump made those remarks (the Consumer Price Index data wasn't out yet to confirm or deny Trump's claims). It appears as though Trump may have been talking about wholesale prices, which had been tumbling throughout March before normalizing in recent weeks. Nevertheless, wholesale prices fell by half – not close to the 90%+ figures Trump was citing. Wholesale prices are the costs distributors pay to farmers or middlemen. Consumer prices are what customers pay at grocery stores. Those costs typically make their way through the supply chain at a slower pace, because grocery stores may decide to keep prices at a certain price, even when wholesale prices change, to try to recoup lost profits from prior weeks, according to Kevin Bergquist, sector manager at Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute. The USDA says consumer prices finally fell as demand for eggs decreased and avian flu cases have fallen. Many groceries, including large chains like Costco, had limited customers' purchases because of egg shortages. So Trump's claim that consumer egg prices are down is finally true – even if the timing of his claim and the wild percentages he threw around were grossly inaccurate. CNN's Alicia Wallace contributed to this report.
