THE WEST LOOP in Chicago was once the city’s meatpacking district. That is long gone, but the neighbourhood is still a place where people come from miles around to buy beef. At Au Cheval, a fancy burger joint where tourists queue up for hours, the signature dish is a double cheeseburger served with a fried egg. It is reputed, at least among Chicagoans, to be the best burger in the world. Yet the price of such a delight is rising. It is not only that eggs now sell for $6 a dozen, thanks to bird flu. More quietly, beef has been rising in price for years now too. And thanks to Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs, it may be about to get much worse.
Since January 2020 the average price of a pound of beef mince has risen from $3.90 to $5.60, according to the Bureau of Labour Statistics. That is a 45% increase, almost double the general rate of inflation. The price rise is the result of high demand combined with tight supply, according to the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, a lobby group for the industry. Thanks to underinvestment a decade ago America’s cattle herd is smaller than in the past, but Americans still love their burgers and steaks. There is now a national beef shortfall.
Thankfully, imports have saved the day. As recently as 2022 America was a net exporter of beef. That has now reversed. Last year imports totalled 2m head of live cattle and 4.6bn pounds (2.1bn kg) of the dead variety–a record high. That has stopped prices rising further. Yet Mr Trump seems more worried about foreign herds crossing the border than he is about inflation. On March 3rd, on his social-media platform, Truth Social, the president staked out a new position. On April 2nd he will be imposing hefty new tariffs on agricultural imports. That will probably include beef. Farmers, he said, should “get ready” to grow food to sell to Americans, and “have fun”.
One might think cattlemen at least would be delighted. Unlike say, soyabean farmers, who largely export their crop and so will get hit by reciprocal tariffs, they are at a medium-rare advantage: Americans are already buyers, and a squeeze on imports will merely push up the price. “You could make the argument…it is actually going to help the domestic market,” says Steve Sonderman, a rancher in north-east Nebraska. The problem, he goes on to explain, is that ranching is more complicated than that. “We’re trying to be in a rebuilding phase for the herd,” he says. A sudden price spike would encourage farmers to sell down their stocks rather than invest. Meanwhile, consumers might learn to like alternatives to red meat. “So it’d be a great thing for price, but probably a horrible thing for the industry,” he says.
Even if the proposed agricultural tariffs do not go into effect, a now partially suspended separate 25% tariff on Canada and Mexico may be reimposed. Just like an engine part, a cow may cross many borders before it is finally eaten. Of America’s imported cows, a large share are calves raised in Mexico then brought to America to fatten. Once fattened, many then go to Canadian slaughterhouses, with the product subsequently reimported. That may all be disrupted too. Mr Trump famously likes to eat his steaks well done. With these tariffs he may be the one who gets burnt.
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