JBS is an Evil Monopoly
And what we can do to stop it.
During this particular time in American history, there are precious few things Republicans, Democrats, Progressives, Libertarians and Independents can agree on.
There’s an unhealthy dynamic online, driven in part by algorithims and social media companies designed to suck us all into a kind of black hole of addictive attention. The more time we spend entranced~ clicking, watching and scrolling, the more advertisers will shell out. Often the way to get us to stay on the app, to click the next video is to feed us an ever-spiraling sequence of more shocking content that usually reinforces our pre-existing beliefs and deepens our outrage at the ‘other’ side.
This polarization has led to shocking levels of estrangement in our culture. It’s increasingly difficult to find people able to have friendly disagreements about a given topic. It’s increasingly difficult for family members with differing political viewpoints to stay in communication.
But there’s one topic, perhaps the only topic, upon which people across the political spectrum can agree. Monopolies are destroying our culture. They’ve gained a stranglehold on our economy, and in so doing the quality of our products and experiences have gone down while at the same time the prices for everything has gone up. Monopolists pay off the political players necessary, and you have what is commonly referred to as regulatory capture.
For example, in agriculture, the problem is severe: Four meatpackers control more than 80% of market. In a particularly stomach-churning example of corruption, JBS, which are the initials of its founder José Batista Sobrinho, bought off multiple members of the House of Representatives to overturn Country of Origin Labeling, commonly referred to as COOL. The result of this corruption was that we as citizens of America can no longer know what country the meat in the grocery store or at the restaurant comes from. More than 90% of the American people wanted to have this labeling, but through regulatory capture it was overturned. The politician who led the charge to overturn COOL, John Boehner was appointed to the board of JBS shortly after retiring from his career as a politician.
And when we are in the grocery store companies can legally say “Product of the USA” on a piece of meat even if it was raised and slaughtered in Brazil (where JBS is based) because the meat was put onto a piece of sytrofoam here.
What’s even worse is that because JBS and others can lie about the meat’s origin and sell it into the American market it puts our cattle ranchers, hog farmers and chicken farmers out of business. We’ve had 89% of our hog farmers go under since 1980, and more than 50% of our cattle ranchers. These numbers are staggering and they are delivering a gut punch to rural America. Less American farmers means less families in rural America, less kids in schools. It eventually leads to ghost-towns throughout the Midwest that have only two functioning storefronts, a grain elevator, and a post-office.
But there’s good news. There are local farms all across America where we can buy our food from. A pretty good database is at Local Harvest. We can go to farm stands, farmers markets and buy CSA shares.
Even better we can grow our own food, like Jared Goforth or have a whole hog roast for our next party from Gunthorp Farms or the local equivalent.
In summary, there’s an ugly beautiful truth to all of the problems we face. We, the people, can change it. If we wanted to put JBS out of business, we could do it. All we have to do is stop buying meat if we don’t know it was raised by an American farmer. If we all did that for a six-month period, the corrupt, disease ridden company would cease to exist. The best strategy is to shake the hand that feeds you. It can be easy to be misled by brands because JBS, for instance, owns 112 different companies.
On the flip side, if we choose to put our food dollars to pay local farmers, our regional food system will expand, we’ll have more jobs here in America, and we’ll have healthier food. School enrollment expands. Storefronts open up on Main St.
The choice is ours.
Thanks for the post. USDA is also part of the problem. Requiring all farmers butcher their meat at USDA butchering facility where all meat is then dipped in chlorine because these facilities have proven to not to be as clean and sanitary as they should be. This lessens the nutritional value of the meat and adds needless chemicals into our diets. So yes...choose a local farmer. But also choose one that butchers the meat he raises. I use a local Amish farm (who is highly skilled in butchering) for all my meat, eggs and milk. They have been raided twice by local officials and had their meat stolen and destroyed. But they are back in operation as the Amish and their customers have stood up to this illegal action. Something similar happened in Pennsylvania and the Amish won their court case. This is all about food freedom. It is about food education as well. Thanks Graham.
Amen! Matt Stiller here on substack does a great job documenting how monopolies are destroying every facet of America