4 ms·

Kelloggs, General Mills, and Nestle hired lawyers that appealed to populism to convince jurors that egg producers price fixed with a probability of at least 51%

by Aunche 3y ago

Kelloggs, General Mills, and Nestle hired lawyers that appealed to populism to convince jurors that egg producers price fixed with a probability of at least 51%. That's hardly proof of price fixing.

falcolas 3y ago
> finding that the egg suppliers had exported eggs to cut supply in the US market, as well as limiting the number of hens, reducing flocks and killing chickens earlier than they usually did. It was sufficient proof to convince a full jury, which makes them guilty of price fixing. They can certainly appeal, that's how the court process works. It's how all trials in the US work. Also, I have to take issue with the insinuation that these egg producers are the underdogs with a small business budget for lawyers themselves. They're the largest egg producers in the US with billions of dollars worth of assets.
- gruez 3y ago
  > > finding that the egg suppliers had exported eggs to cut supply in the US market, as well as limiting the number of hens, reducing flocks and killing chickens earlier than they usually did. Going back to your prior comment: >It's amusing to point out eggs as some kind of holy grail of how price moves naturally, when the two largest egg producers (Cal-Maine Foods and Rose Acre Farms) were just fined in federal court for price fixing. I mean, prices did move naturally. The egg producers reduced supply and price went up "naturally". In the case of covid "greedflation", you don't really need an explanation to explain the reduced supply and/or increased demand: covid and stimulus checks explain the situation pretty well.
- Aunche 3y ago
  > It was sufficient proof to convince a full jury, which makes them guilty of price fixing. Sure, but it's still the lowest burden of proof. My point isn't to make Cal-Maine the underdog. It's to point out the irony that anticapitalists will suddenly trust capitalists 100% whenever they say something that agrees with them, regardless of the motivations of such a claim. It's like when people use Microsoft's antitrust lawsuits as evidence as that all billionaires can't be trusted, yet they're completely uncritically accepting arguments made by lawyers who represented other billionaires. Of course the market is perfectly efficient, but 90% of the time it is, especially for commodities like eggs. It may be the case that this is getting worse, but no it is not possible for companies to suddenly decided to be greedy in 2021.
  - danaris 3y ago
    > anticapitalists will suddenly trust capitalists 100% whenever they say something that agrees with them This seems like a twisting of the facts. First of all, one does not need to be "anticapitalist" to believe that price-fixing is bad. Second of all, it's less that we will suddenly "trust capitalists" and more that when you've got an actual trial in our actual justice system (whether civil or criminal) and solid evidence can be presented to prove that one set of capitalists was acting in bad faith (that just happened to be in a way that happened to hurt other capitalists as well as regular people)... ...it holds much more weight than just "someone saying something", whatever preexisting biases it might agree with.
    - Aunche 3y ago
      If you have so much faith in civil jury verdicts, then do the previous lawsuits against egg producers where the jury found them innocent disprove the conspiracy [1]? Afaict, there was no direct evidence of any conspiracy. The egg producers were exporting more eggs and giving chickens more room. The former can be explained by market conditions and the latter can be explained by pressure from animal rights organizations. [1] https://news.bloomberglaw.com/antitrust/kraft-kellogg-go-after-egg-producers-for-price-fixing-scheme-39 https://news.bloomberglaw.com/antitrust/kraft-kellogg-go-aft...
autoexec 3y ago
I think the increase in profits is proof enough. https://abc7.com/eggs-egg-prices-cal-maine-foods-profits/13041987/ https://abc7.com/eggs-egg-prices-cal-maine-foods-profits/130...
- Aunche 3y ago
  This is completely unrelated to the lawsuit which was about activity that occured decades ago. None of Cal-Maine's chickens contracted bird flu, despite being the largest egg producers, so they likely are better at protecting their chickens from disease than their competitors. Why shouldn't they be rewarded for this?
  - autoexec 3y ago
    Somewhat unrelated to the old lawsuit, but not entirely since they're being accused to the same behaviors. There have been calls for the FTC to investigate them for "price gouging, price coordination, and other unfair or deceptive acts" (https://farmaction.us/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Farm-Action-Letter-to-FTC-Chair-Lina-Khan.pdf https://farmaction.us/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Farm-Action...) It's beyond absurd to suggest that Cal-Maine deserves a "reward" of > 700% profit for their chickens not getting a disease. I can't even fathom your reasoning there. Their "reward" should be "having plenty of eggs to sell when some of their competitors don't" not record high price increases for no reason in the middle of a global pandemic where household debt is at record levels and families are struggling to keep food on their tables and roofs over their heads.
    - Aunche 3y ago
      They didn't make $7 profit for every $1 in costs. They made 700% more profit than the previous year, bringing it to about the same profit margin as Apple for a year. Do you think that Apple should be content with having plenty of iPhones to sell? Why shouldn't egg producers be allowed to have the same profit margins as tech companies?
      - whatevaa 3y ago

by Aunche 3y ago

Kelloggs, General Mills, and Nestle hired lawyers that appealed to populism to convince jurors that egg producers price fixed with a probability of at least 51%. That's hardly proof of price fixing.

falcolas 3y ago

> finding that the egg suppliers had exported eggs to cut supply in the US market, as well as limiting the number of hens, reducing flocks and killing chickens earlier than they usually did. It was sufficient proof to convince a full jury, which makes them guilty of price fixing. They can certainly appeal, that's how the court process works. It's how all trials in the US work. Also, I have to take issue with the insinuation that these egg producers are the underdogs with a small business budget for lawyers themselves. They're the largest egg producers in the US with billions of dollars worth of assets.

gruez 3y ago
> > finding that the egg suppliers had exported eggs to cut supply in the US market, as well as limiting the number of hens, reducing flocks and killing chickens earlier than they usually did. Going back to your prior comment: >It's amusing to point out eggs as some kind of holy grail of how price moves naturally, when the two largest egg producers (Cal-Maine Foods and Rose Acre Farms) were just fined in federal court for price fixing. I mean, prices did move naturally. The egg producers reduced supply and price went up "naturally". In the case of covid "greedflation", you don't really need an explanation to explain the reduced supply and/or increased demand: covid and stimulus checks explain the situation pretty well.
Aunche 3y ago
> It was sufficient proof to convince a full jury, which makes them guilty of price fixing. Sure, but it's still the lowest burden of proof. My point isn't to make Cal-Maine the underdog. It's to point out the irony that anticapitalists will suddenly trust capitalists 100% whenever they say something that agrees with them, regardless of the motivations of such a claim. It's like when people use Microsoft's antitrust lawsuits as evidence as that all billionaires can't be trusted, yet they're completely uncritically accepting arguments made by lawyers who represented other billionaires. Of course the market is perfectly efficient, but 90% of the time it is, especially for commodities like eggs. It may be the case that this is getting worse, but no it is not possible for companies to suddenly decided to be greedy in 2021.
- danaris 3y ago
  > anticapitalists will suddenly trust capitalists 100% whenever they say something that agrees with them This seems like a twisting of the facts. First of all, one does not need to be "anticapitalist" to believe that price-fixing is bad. Second of all, it's less that we will suddenly "trust capitalists" and more that when you've got an actual trial in our actual justice system (whether civil or criminal) and solid evidence can be presented to prove that one set of capitalists was acting in bad faith (that just happened to be in a way that happened to hurt other capitalists as well as regular people)... ...it holds much more weight than just "someone saying something", whatever preexisting biases it might agree with.
  - Aunche 3y ago
    If you have so much faith in civil jury verdicts, then do the previous lawsuits against egg producers where the jury found them innocent disprove the conspiracy [1]? Afaict, there was no direct evidence of any conspiracy. The egg producers were exporting more eggs and giving chickens more room. The former can be explained by market conditions and the latter can be explained by pressure from animal rights organizations. [1] https://news.bloomberglaw.com/antitrust/kraft-kellogg-go-after-egg-producers-for-price-fixing-scheme-39 https://news.bloomberglaw.com/antitrust/kraft-kellogg-go-aft...

autoexec 3y ago

I think the increase in profits is proof enough. https://abc7.com/eggs-egg-prices-cal-maine-foods-profits/13041987/ https://abc7.com/eggs-egg-prices-cal-maine-foods-profits/130...

Aunche 3y ago
This is completely unrelated to the lawsuit which was about activity that occured decades ago. None of Cal-Maine's chickens contracted bird flu, despite being the largest egg producers, so they likely are better at protecting their chickens from disease than their competitors. Why shouldn't they be rewarded for this?
- autoexec 3y ago
  Somewhat unrelated to the old lawsuit, but not entirely since they're being accused to the same behaviors. There have been calls for the FTC to investigate them for "price gouging, price coordination, and other unfair or deceptive acts" (https://farmaction.us/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Farm-Action-Letter-to-FTC-Chair-Lina-Khan.pdf https://farmaction.us/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Farm-Action...) It's beyond absurd to suggest that Cal-Maine deserves a "reward" of > 700% profit for their chickens not getting a disease. I can't even fathom your reasoning there. Their "reward" should be "having plenty of eggs to sell when some of their competitors don't" not record high price increases for no reason in the middle of a global pandemic where household debt is at record levels and families are struggling to keep food on their tables and roofs over their heads.
  - Aunche 3y ago
    They didn't make $7 profit for every $1 in costs. They made 700% more profit than the previous year, bringing it to about the same profit margin as Apple for a year. Do you think that Apple should be content with having plenty of iPhones to sell? Why shouldn't egg producers be allowed to have the same profit margins as tech companies?
    - whatevaa 3y ago