1 00:00:03,120 --> 00:00:08,320 Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, Radio News. 2 00:00:10,520 --> 00:00:13,480 Speaker 2: Hello and welcome to a very special crossover episode of 3 00:00:13,520 --> 00:00:18,680 Speaker 2: The Money Stuff slash Odd Lots Podcasts. I'm Matt Levien, 4 00:00:18,720 --> 00:00:20,800 Speaker 2: and I write The Money Stuff com for Bloomberg Opinion. 5 00:00:21,200 --> 00:00:23,599 Speaker 3: And I'm Katie Greifeld, a reporter for Bloomberg News and 6 00:00:23,640 --> 00:00:25,120 Speaker 3: an anchor for Bloomberg Television. 7 00:00:25,640 --> 00:00:28,040 Speaker 2: And we have two very special guests in the studio 8 00:00:28,080 --> 00:00:29,200 Speaker 2: with us today, Katie. 9 00:00:29,520 --> 00:00:34,120 Speaker 3: Their names are Joe Wisenthal and Tracy Alloway. Wow, this 10 00:00:34,240 --> 00:00:35,200 Speaker 3: is very exciting. 11 00:00:36,479 --> 00:00:38,839 Speaker 1: I like the pause to build suspense, Kate. 12 00:00:38,920 --> 00:00:41,920 Speaker 3: I've been told to pause and then say names slowly 13 00:00:42,000 --> 00:00:44,600 Speaker 3: for gravitas, so trying it's working. 14 00:00:44,760 --> 00:00:46,680 Speaker 4: It worked, It worked, It worked all right. 15 00:00:46,920 --> 00:00:49,199 Speaker 2: We established in gravitas. 16 00:00:53,800 --> 00:00:56,120 Speaker 4: For what it's worth. Tracy and I like spent three 17 00:00:56,200 --> 00:00:59,680 Speaker 4: years of Odd Lots workshopping ways to introduce guests. And 18 00:00:59,720 --> 00:01:01,920 Speaker 4: I know we're early the second time you've had external guests, 19 00:01:02,200 --> 00:01:03,440 Speaker 4: So don't feel any. 20 00:01:03,440 --> 00:01:04,320 Speaker 3: My heart is counted. 21 00:01:04,360 --> 00:01:06,600 Speaker 4: Don't feel any anxiety about the guest. Do you remember 22 00:01:06,640 --> 00:01:07,679 Speaker 4: how we used to do it, Tracy? 23 00:01:07,800 --> 00:01:08,000 Speaker 3: Yeah. 24 00:01:08,080 --> 00:01:10,479 Speaker 1: We used to pretend that neither of us or one 25 00:01:10,480 --> 00:01:12,360 Speaker 1: of us didn't know what we were going to talk about, 26 00:01:12,480 --> 00:01:14,559 Speaker 1: and it was like, guess what we're going to talk about, 27 00:01:14,720 --> 00:01:17,200 Speaker 1: But it didn't make any sense because like we clearly 28 00:01:17,280 --> 00:01:18,479 Speaker 1: knew what we were going to talk about. 29 00:01:18,560 --> 00:01:19,479 Speaker 4: So it took us a while. 30 00:01:19,720 --> 00:01:21,680 Speaker 3: How are we doing so far? Because I feel like 31 00:01:21,720 --> 00:01:23,800 Speaker 3: it's not going super well, it's going fine. 32 00:01:24,200 --> 00:01:25,320 Speaker 2: What are we going to talk about? 33 00:01:26,120 --> 00:01:27,560 Speaker 3: What someone should make it? 34 00:01:27,640 --> 00:01:28,800 Speaker 1: Flu brought us here? 35 00:01:29,800 --> 00:01:32,360 Speaker 3: Let's talk about chickens. You guys obviously have a lot 36 00:01:32,360 --> 00:01:36,280 Speaker 3: to say. You did a three part series on chickens recently, 37 00:01:36,360 --> 00:01:39,080 Speaker 3: which was pretty cool because I feel like this was 38 00:01:39,120 --> 00:01:40,520 Speaker 3: something different for you guys. 39 00:01:40,760 --> 00:01:43,080 Speaker 1: Yeah, every once in a while we like to shake 40 00:01:43,120 --> 00:01:45,840 Speaker 1: things up and do something slightly different. Last year, we 41 00:01:45,880 --> 00:01:48,800 Speaker 1: actually did a three part series on the rollout of 42 00:01:48,840 --> 00:01:53,480 Speaker 1: New York's legal marijuana OOH market called pot Lots. This 43 00:01:53,520 --> 00:01:56,400 Speaker 1: one was a three part series about chicken, and the 44 00:01:56,440 --> 00:01:59,160 Speaker 1: code name for it was squawk Lots, but the actual 45 00:01:59,240 --> 00:02:03,560 Speaker 1: name was capitalism, and the idea was you can actually 46 00:02:03,680 --> 00:02:07,120 Speaker 1: explain a lot of really interesting themes in the American 47 00:02:07,160 --> 00:02:09,760 Speaker 1: economy through the medium of chicken. 48 00:02:09,960 --> 00:02:13,600 Speaker 4: Yeah, you just think from like egg to chicken sandwich, 49 00:02:14,000 --> 00:02:17,679 Speaker 4: or egg to chicken tender, or egg to mc nugget. 50 00:02:17,440 --> 00:02:18,560 Speaker 3: I mean speak for yourself. 51 00:02:18,800 --> 00:02:20,920 Speaker 4: There are just so many interesting Like the sort of 52 00:02:20,919 --> 00:02:23,840 Speaker 4: premise is, there are just so many really interesting things 53 00:02:24,320 --> 00:02:27,960 Speaker 4: that can be discussed along that entire supply chain. So, 54 00:02:28,040 --> 00:02:31,400 Speaker 4: whether it's avian flu and how to keep the flock 55 00:02:31,440 --> 00:02:35,440 Speaker 4: of the birds, whether it's concentration in the poultry market, 56 00:02:35,440 --> 00:02:37,720 Speaker 4: whether it's the nature of the labor market, how the 57 00:02:37,720 --> 00:02:42,600 Speaker 4: big poultry companies contract with independent growers and so forth 58 00:02:42,639 --> 00:02:45,880 Speaker 4: who out raise the chickens themselves, which is interesting. Then 59 00:02:45,880 --> 00:02:48,760 Speaker 4: there's questions about pricing and so forth, and then commodity prices, 60 00:02:48,800 --> 00:02:51,799 Speaker 4: and then the chicken sandwich wars and the consumer experience 61 00:02:51,840 --> 00:02:55,680 Speaker 4: of why Papa is versus Panda express verse whoever, There's 62 00:02:55,720 --> 00:02:59,000 Speaker 4: a million different things even within all these things where 63 00:02:59,040 --> 00:03:00,960 Speaker 4: it's like we can learn a little something about how 64 00:03:01,000 --> 00:03:02,640 Speaker 4: the economy works through that trajectory. 65 00:03:03,080 --> 00:03:05,600 Speaker 2: How did you decide on that? Was that like you're like, 66 00:03:05,600 --> 00:03:07,280 Speaker 2: we want to talk about chicken first, and then later 67 00:03:07,320 --> 00:03:09,040 Speaker 2: you realize there are a lot of rinses, or you're like, 68 00:03:09,040 --> 00:03:10,799 Speaker 2: we need to talk about anti trust. 69 00:03:12,200 --> 00:03:12,519 Speaker 3: Chicken. 70 00:03:13,240 --> 00:03:18,400 Speaker 1: I actually I'm struggling to remember what the exactmber chickens 71 00:03:18,440 --> 00:03:21,360 Speaker 1: in your backyard. Yeah, I have a long term love 72 00:03:21,600 --> 00:03:24,400 Speaker 1: of chickens, and my great ambition in life is to 73 00:03:24,480 --> 00:03:28,320 Speaker 1: one day have backyard chickens. And I'm inching closer. 74 00:03:28,040 --> 00:03:30,760 Speaker 2: To actually a love of chickens. Do you mean alive 75 00:03:30,960 --> 00:03:33,440 Speaker 2: chickens to hang out with or dead chickens to eat 76 00:03:33,560 --> 00:03:38,560 Speaker 2: or both totally different? Both like one then the other. 77 00:03:39,120 --> 00:03:41,440 Speaker 1: Well, I would raise chickens and I would have eggs, 78 00:03:41,520 --> 00:03:44,040 Speaker 1: and that way I would be immune to egg inflation. 79 00:03:44,280 --> 00:03:47,360 Speaker 1: But I know some people who raise meat chickens, and 80 00:03:47,520 --> 00:03:49,560 Speaker 1: I don't think I would do that so hard. It's 81 00:03:49,600 --> 00:03:53,720 Speaker 1: depressing because meat chickens are very different to egg laying chickens. 82 00:03:53,840 --> 00:03:56,320 Speaker 1: They look different, they don't really do anything. They kind 83 00:03:56,320 --> 00:03:58,520 Speaker 1: of just like waddle around and flop over. 84 00:03:58,560 --> 00:03:59,560 Speaker 4: The one day you kill them. 85 00:03:59,640 --> 00:04:00,960 Speaker 1: Yeah, it's sad. 86 00:04:01,080 --> 00:04:05,480 Speaker 4: The other thing too. In additioned to Tracy's affinity for chickens, 87 00:04:05,680 --> 00:04:07,760 Speaker 4: we've done a lot of chicken episodes in the past. 88 00:04:07,960 --> 00:04:10,120 Speaker 4: So there's this guy, Glenn Hickman, that we talked to. 89 00:04:10,400 --> 00:04:12,320 Speaker 4: We've talked to him twice on the show. He has 90 00:04:12,360 --> 00:04:15,880 Speaker 4: a big egg operation in Arizona, and so we talked 91 00:04:15,880 --> 00:04:18,200 Speaker 4: about when egg prices were surging, we talked to him 92 00:04:18,400 --> 00:04:22,559 Speaker 4: when Avian flew, which unfortunately like is getting headlines again, 93 00:04:22,760 --> 00:04:25,359 Speaker 4: we talked to him. We've talked to Samuel Ryans and 94 00:04:25,400 --> 00:04:28,000 Speaker 4: analysts who thought that Wings stopped the country's biggest chicken 95 00:04:28,080 --> 00:04:30,560 Speaker 4: chain and the biggest single buyer. And there are certain 96 00:04:30,640 --> 00:04:33,279 Speaker 4: lessons about pricing power that we learned because, you know, 97 00:04:33,320 --> 00:04:36,160 Speaker 4: a wholesale Wings went up, they raised the prices aggressively. 98 00:04:36,360 --> 00:04:38,800 Speaker 4: When wholesale Wing prices went down, they did not cut 99 00:04:38,800 --> 00:04:42,960 Speaker 4: their prices. So we've done a lot of chicken related 100 00:04:43,000 --> 00:04:44,520 Speaker 4: content in the past. It's like, oh, why don't we 101 00:04:44,560 --> 00:04:45,400 Speaker 4: like put some of this together. 102 00:04:45,480 --> 00:04:48,200 Speaker 1: This was the surprising thing when we were putting together 103 00:04:48,400 --> 00:04:50,080 Speaker 1: you know, the list of people that we wanted to 104 00:04:50,120 --> 00:04:53,200 Speaker 1: speak to for this series, like eighty percent of them 105 00:04:53,240 --> 00:04:56,600 Speaker 1: we had actually spoken to before, so unknowingly we were 106 00:04:56,640 --> 00:04:57,920 Speaker 1: already a chicken podcast. 107 00:04:57,920 --> 00:04:58,160 Speaker 5: Wow. 108 00:04:58,320 --> 00:05:00,000 Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like it found you guys. 109 00:05:00,120 --> 00:05:02,800 Speaker 2: Yes, when you were putting together that list, where was 110 00:05:02,920 --> 00:05:08,760 Speaker 2: Ray Dahalia? Are you pretending to not know? 111 00:05:08,960 --> 00:05:11,159 Speaker 4: Now? I feel really dumb. 112 00:05:11,000 --> 00:05:13,440 Speaker 1: Because it's like, does he have that huge chicken coop 113 00:05:14,760 --> 00:05:16,080 Speaker 1: London guy? Oh? 114 00:05:16,279 --> 00:05:16,479 Speaker 4: What? 115 00:05:16,680 --> 00:05:17,040 Speaker 1: No? 116 00:05:17,320 --> 00:05:18,960 Speaker 3: I feel like this is too good to be true. 117 00:05:19,080 --> 00:05:19,960 Speaker 2: It's too good. 118 00:05:19,839 --> 00:05:26,320 Speaker 4: To be true. So what's the urban legend. 119 00:05:26,880 --> 00:05:30,560 Speaker 2: Of course, this comes from Ray Dalia, like including on 120 00:05:30,680 --> 00:05:34,000 Speaker 2: podcasts and I think on like the Bridgewater website. When 121 00:05:34,040 --> 00:05:36,720 Speaker 2: he was working on Wall Street before I started Bridgewater, 122 00:05:36,760 --> 00:05:39,039 Speaker 2: he was like doing commodity stuff and one of his 123 00:05:39,080 --> 00:05:42,719 Speaker 2: clients was McDonald's, and McDonald's were I think this is 124 00:05:42,800 --> 00:05:45,200 Speaker 2: like according to your history, Like this is a few 125 00:05:45,279 --> 00:05:47,880 Speaker 2: years after they had like introduced the chicken nugget, but 126 00:05:47,920 --> 00:05:50,280 Speaker 2: before they rolled it out nashally, and they were worried 127 00:05:50,960 --> 00:05:55,480 Speaker 2: apparently about volatility of chicken prices because they're like, wow, 128 00:05:55,520 --> 00:05:58,240 Speaker 2: we can't put chicken nuggets on the menu if the 129 00:05:58,279 --> 00:05:59,720 Speaker 2: price is going to go up and down because they 130 00:05:59,760 --> 00:06:01,240 Speaker 2: have to it off the menu. Were raised the prices, 131 00:06:01,240 --> 00:06:04,640 Speaker 2: it would be terrible. We need to take the volatility 132 00:06:04,640 --> 00:06:07,599 Speaker 2: out of chicken prices. And they came to Ray Dalio 133 00:06:07,640 --> 00:06:11,479 Speaker 2: allegedly and they're like, can you sell us as? And 134 00:06:11,560 --> 00:06:13,680 Speaker 2: Ray Dalio is like, wow, there's not like a liquid 135 00:06:13,800 --> 00:06:17,640 Speaker 2: chicken market at the time. This is I think from 136 00:06:17,040 --> 00:06:20,960 Speaker 2: the Bridgewater website. He argued that since a full grown 137 00:06:21,040 --> 00:06:23,279 Speaker 2: chicken was nothing more than a baby chick plus corn 138 00:06:23,320 --> 00:06:25,479 Speaker 2: and soy mail, the price of the grains or the 139 00:06:25,520 --> 00:06:28,920 Speaker 2: volatile costs and they could hedge corn and soybean prices 140 00:06:29,000 --> 00:06:32,080 Speaker 2: and they could, And so he sold McDonald's a bunch 141 00:06:32,120 --> 00:06:34,039 Speaker 2: of cord and saw derivatives and they were able to 142 00:06:34,120 --> 00:06:35,160 Speaker 2: roll out the chicken McNugget. 143 00:06:35,279 --> 00:06:35,479 Speaker 3: Yeah. 144 00:06:35,480 --> 00:06:38,159 Speaker 1: First of all, I love that Ray Dalio's like chosen 145 00:06:38,279 --> 00:06:43,000 Speaker 1: creationist story for himself. His background legend is I helped 146 00:06:43,040 --> 00:06:44,400 Speaker 1: invent chicken McNuggets. 147 00:06:44,600 --> 00:06:45,200 Speaker 2: That's a good one. 148 00:06:45,480 --> 00:06:49,440 Speaker 1: Secondly, McDonald's did not invent chicken McNuggets, which is something 149 00:06:49,440 --> 00:06:50,880 Speaker 1: that we learned from the podcast. 150 00:06:51,120 --> 00:06:54,520 Speaker 2: McDonald's did not invent the chicken nugget, but Ray Dalio 151 00:06:54,760 --> 00:06:57,680 Speaker 2: shepherded well chicken McNugget as a menu ad of me. 152 00:06:58,000 --> 00:07:00,279 Speaker 1: Sure, okay, fine, we'll let him have that one. But 153 00:07:00,640 --> 00:07:03,560 Speaker 1: the interesting thing is we did learn about volatility in 154 00:07:03,720 --> 00:07:07,000 Speaker 1: pricing because this is something that the Wingstop CEO actually 155 00:07:07,080 --> 00:07:09,720 Speaker 1: brings up. One of the reasons we saw chicken wing 156 00:07:09,840 --> 00:07:12,920 Speaker 1: prices specifically go up so much in the aftermath of 157 00:07:12,920 --> 00:07:15,360 Speaker 1: the pandemic was that it turns out they're the most 158 00:07:15,440 --> 00:07:16,920 Speaker 1: volatile like part. 159 00:07:16,920 --> 00:07:20,239 Speaker 4: Of the chicken can I say, I have a carcharian opinion. 160 00:07:20,600 --> 00:07:23,560 Speaker 4: I think Ray Dalio did invent the chicken McNugget. Anyone 161 00:07:23,640 --> 00:07:26,280 Speaker 4: could invent a fried lump of chicken, it takes a 162 00:07:26,320 --> 00:07:29,640 Speaker 4: true genius to invent the financial hedging instruments that allows 163 00:07:29,680 --> 00:07:32,520 Speaker 4: it to be commercialable. So I now accept the premise 164 00:07:32,800 --> 00:07:35,960 Speaker 4: that actually he and not the person who like put 165 00:07:36,000 --> 00:07:39,000 Speaker 4: the chicken meat in batter should get actually be the 166 00:07:39,000 --> 00:07:39,440 Speaker 4: true father. 167 00:07:40,200 --> 00:07:43,200 Speaker 2: I think that financial engineering underrated. Is that moving forward 168 00:07:43,240 --> 00:07:45,480 Speaker 2: in the real economy like this he did the financial 169 00:07:45,520 --> 00:07:48,040 Speaker 2: engineering behind the chicken. Tracy is shaking her. 170 00:07:47,920 --> 00:07:50,559 Speaker 1: Head, Well, you're right. It got to an interesting question 171 00:07:50,600 --> 00:07:54,480 Speaker 1: about what drives progress. Is there underlying technology or is 172 00:07:54,480 --> 00:07:54,880 Speaker 1: it the. 173 00:07:54,760 --> 00:08:01,440 Speaker 5: Fan first, which came first? The nugget or the financial 174 00:08:01,440 --> 00:08:04,280 Speaker 5: engineer and get to bad rap And it turns out 175 00:08:04,320 --> 00:08:05,040 Speaker 5: if you need that. 176 00:08:05,240 --> 00:08:07,360 Speaker 1: Commercials easy to consume proteins. 177 00:08:07,440 --> 00:08:10,160 Speaker 4: Yeah, I take it. I now give the crown director. 178 00:08:10,160 --> 00:08:12,520 Speaker 2: Do you think that right? Like every every like major innovation, 179 00:08:12,720 --> 00:08:14,800 Speaker 2: like there's the step of physical invention, and then there's 180 00:08:14,800 --> 00:08:17,520 Speaker 2: the step of like working out the financing, and like 181 00:08:17,560 --> 00:08:25,880 Speaker 2: the financing people are generally unheralded but well paid. 182 00:08:20,040 --> 00:08:25,920 Speaker 1: And I think Dahlia is managing. Yeah, but this is 183 00:08:26,000 --> 00:08:28,360 Speaker 1: Joe's pitch to try to get right on the podcast, 184 00:08:28,400 --> 00:08:30,680 Speaker 1: I think to talk about chicken, we. 185 00:08:30,640 --> 00:08:32,880 Speaker 2: Should have him on our podcast to talk about you know, 186 00:08:33,679 --> 00:08:36,280 Speaker 2: who is the New York Mets manager who claimed to 187 00:08:36,280 --> 00:08:37,680 Speaker 2: invent the rap Do you remember that? 188 00:08:38,200 --> 00:08:39,880 Speaker 4: Who is it? You know, the rap sandwich? 189 00:08:40,160 --> 00:08:40,840 Speaker 3: I've heard of it. 190 00:08:40,960 --> 00:08:44,200 Speaker 4: The New York Mets manager in the nineties claim to 191 00:08:44,280 --> 00:08:47,000 Speaker 4: have invented the wrap sandwich. I can't remember his name 192 00:08:47,200 --> 00:08:48,839 Speaker 4: right now. Anyway, it sort of reminds. 193 00:08:48,559 --> 00:08:50,959 Speaker 3: Me have that like claiming to invent the apple pie. 194 00:08:51,200 --> 00:08:53,960 Speaker 3: Like if you just say loudly enough, it's probably true. 195 00:08:54,280 --> 00:08:56,200 Speaker 3: Can we talk about why wings are the most valutile 196 00:08:56,200 --> 00:08:58,520 Speaker 3: part of the chicken? I did not know that. I 197 00:08:58,520 --> 00:09:01,400 Speaker 3: would have thought it was, I guess any other part 198 00:09:01,440 --> 00:09:02,280 Speaker 3: of the chicken. 199 00:09:02,160 --> 00:09:05,760 Speaker 2: From your podcast. I thought it was that the supply 200 00:09:05,840 --> 00:09:08,840 Speaker 2: of chickens is set by the demand for chicken breasts, 201 00:09:09,080 --> 00:09:11,760 Speaker 2: and so for chicken breast goes down, the supply of 202 00:09:11,800 --> 00:09:15,760 Speaker 2: chickens goes down, and wings do not drive the supply 203 00:09:15,840 --> 00:09:18,679 Speaker 2: of chicken. So the wing price is just like thank 204 00:09:18,720 --> 00:09:19,360 Speaker 2: you for listening. 205 00:09:19,600 --> 00:09:22,240 Speaker 1: That's exactly it. You learn something the chicken. 206 00:09:22,920 --> 00:09:25,319 Speaker 3: The chicken breast is like the benchmark from which all 207 00:09:25,320 --> 00:09:25,760 Speaker 3: the other. 208 00:09:25,640 --> 00:09:28,480 Speaker 2: Parts part, and it's like the thing that's most used 209 00:09:28,480 --> 00:09:31,120 Speaker 2: and so like essentially if your wings not, you're buying 210 00:09:31,120 --> 00:09:34,480 Speaker 2: like a sort of like, yeah. 211 00:09:34,559 --> 00:09:37,960 Speaker 4: I like thie by the way, it's more than the breast. 212 00:09:38,080 --> 00:09:40,400 Speaker 4: I think it's like a better it's like the best cut. 213 00:09:40,480 --> 00:09:44,520 Speaker 1: Have you guys had chicken feet? They're really good and 214 00:09:44,600 --> 00:09:46,880 Speaker 1: in Asia people always say they're a really good source 215 00:09:46,920 --> 00:09:49,760 Speaker 1: of collagen. So like a lot of young women or 216 00:09:50,040 --> 00:09:52,240 Speaker 1: women will eat them for skidcare purpose. 217 00:09:53,320 --> 00:09:55,240 Speaker 3: Do you just sort of slather it on your face? 218 00:09:55,280 --> 00:09:57,240 Speaker 1: No? No, you eat it, you like nibble on it. 219 00:09:57,280 --> 00:09:59,560 Speaker 4: Oh man, you can get it at most dim some 220 00:09:59,640 --> 00:10:02,480 Speaker 4: place Chinatown here, So if we ever want to take 221 00:10:02,520 --> 00:10:05,880 Speaker 4: a trip and it's actually I really find them quite delicious. 222 00:10:05,880 --> 00:10:08,120 Speaker 3: I would love to watch you guys eat that. I'm 223 00:10:08,160 --> 00:10:12,840 Speaker 3: not very adventurous myself, but boy do I like being included. 224 00:10:13,800 --> 00:10:15,720 Speaker 2: I have a new puppy, and I get served a 225 00:10:15,760 --> 00:10:18,400 Speaker 2: lot of ads for a lot of food products, and 226 00:10:18,400 --> 00:10:21,600 Speaker 2: there's definitely like an extremely foot looking chicken foot. 227 00:10:22,880 --> 00:10:26,480 Speaker 3: My hat dried chicken hearts, Like that's a little crunch 228 00:10:26,520 --> 00:10:27,319 Speaker 3: of snack. 229 00:10:28,480 --> 00:10:32,920 Speaker 4: You've had some hearts, yeah, I have? Or chicken liver? 230 00:10:33,080 --> 00:10:35,000 Speaker 4: Is that something? Yeah? 231 00:10:36,600 --> 00:10:39,080 Speaker 1: Make a Thanksgiving stuffing out of chicken liver. 232 00:10:39,120 --> 00:10:40,440 Speaker 3: It's really good timely. 233 00:10:40,720 --> 00:10:44,600 Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll provide our recipe for chicken liver Thanksgiving stuffing 234 00:10:44,640 --> 00:10:46,320 Speaker 1: after this podcast, can I say so? 235 00:10:46,400 --> 00:10:49,720 Speaker 3: This is a three part series. The part that caught 236 00:10:49,800 --> 00:10:52,240 Speaker 3: my ears the most was just like the physicality of 237 00:10:52,280 --> 00:10:55,440 Speaker 3: the chicken and how it's changed that the idea that 238 00:10:55,480 --> 00:10:59,080 Speaker 3: like a chicken in the nineteen twenties looks so much 239 00:10:59,120 --> 00:11:01,800 Speaker 3: different than chicken in the twenty twenties. Like I feel 240 00:11:01,800 --> 00:11:03,360 Speaker 3: like I knew that somewhere in the back of my mind, 241 00:11:03,360 --> 00:11:06,840 Speaker 3: but this really brought it into stark focus for me, 242 00:11:07,160 --> 00:11:09,160 Speaker 3: just how much we've changed chickens. 243 00:11:09,240 --> 00:11:12,199 Speaker 1: Yeah, so chickens, like a lot of domesticated animals, are 244 00:11:12,200 --> 00:11:16,120 Speaker 1: like the products of you know, centuries and certainly decades 245 00:11:16,200 --> 00:11:19,280 Speaker 1: of evolution. Chickens, in case you're wondering, I think they 246 00:11:19,320 --> 00:11:23,440 Speaker 1: originally came from forests of Indonesia, and back then they 247 00:11:23,440 --> 00:11:26,560 Speaker 1: were like skinny little jungle birds, and I think they 248 00:11:26,559 --> 00:11:30,160 Speaker 1: were mostly like black. Anyway, they spread around the world. 249 00:11:30,240 --> 00:11:33,800 Speaker 1: It turns out everyone loves chicken. One of the most 250 00:11:33,920 --> 00:11:37,320 Speaker 1: fascinating parts of chicken history. And I don't know why 251 00:11:37,320 --> 00:11:39,320 Speaker 1: I know this, but for some reason, I do is 252 00:11:39,440 --> 00:11:44,280 Speaker 1: In the eighteen fifties there was a chicken bubble. So 253 00:11:44,320 --> 00:11:48,440 Speaker 1: what happened was Queen Victoria got really into chickens, like 254 00:11:48,559 --> 00:11:52,679 Speaker 1: breeding chickens, exotic chickens, and because she was the queen, 255 00:11:52,960 --> 00:11:54,720 Speaker 1: a bunch of other people got into it, and it 256 00:11:54,800 --> 00:11:57,800 Speaker 1: sort of became this fad where people were paying like 257 00:11:58,040 --> 00:12:01,160 Speaker 1: lots and lots of money to get real exotic. 258 00:12:00,800 --> 00:12:02,280 Speaker 3: Chicken, eating them or just breeding. 259 00:12:02,520 --> 00:12:04,640 Speaker 1: They were just breeding them, they were pat game selling 260 00:12:04,640 --> 00:12:08,560 Speaker 1: them to other people. The bubble eventually burst, by the way, 261 00:12:08,679 --> 00:12:13,280 Speaker 1: and the really interesting probably but the really interesting thing 262 00:12:13,400 --> 00:12:19,200 Speaker 1: is because exotic chickens became cheap, Charles Darwin started doing 263 00:12:19,240 --> 00:12:21,920 Speaker 1: research with all these different chickens from around the world 264 00:12:22,000 --> 00:12:26,840 Speaker 1: on evolutions. So the Victorian chicken bubble indirectly influenced our 265 00:12:26,920 --> 00:12:27,959 Speaker 1: understanding of evolution. 266 00:12:28,120 --> 00:12:32,800 Speaker 4: This is like how the telecom bubble and then and 267 00:12:32,840 --> 00:12:36,480 Speaker 4: then yeah, then because of the we had the evolutionary 268 00:12:36,520 --> 00:12:38,240 Speaker 4: theories of Darwin. I didn't know that this didn't come 269 00:12:38,280 --> 00:12:39,480 Speaker 4: up to it on the podcast. 270 00:12:39,559 --> 00:12:41,199 Speaker 1: No, I kind of figure out where to put it. 271 00:12:41,480 --> 00:12:44,920 Speaker 1: I saved it for this podcast. Periectically, there's a really 272 00:12:44,960 --> 00:12:48,760 Speaker 1: funny book that was written sort of contemporaneously with the 273 00:12:48,840 --> 00:12:51,720 Speaker 1: eighteen fifties all about It's called hen Fever, and it's 274 00:12:51,720 --> 00:12:55,199 Speaker 1: about the chicken bubble, and it has the most amazing illustrations, 275 00:12:55,240 --> 00:12:57,760 Speaker 1: including it has this picture of a guy blowing a 276 00:12:57,760 --> 00:12:59,760 Speaker 1: bunch of different bubbles, and some of them are like 277 00:13:00,120 --> 00:13:03,960 Speaker 1: you would expect, like the south Sea expeditions and railway 278 00:13:03,960 --> 00:13:06,080 Speaker 1: stocks and things like that, but then some of them 279 00:13:06,120 --> 00:13:09,520 Speaker 1: are shang his and coachins, which are types of chickens. 280 00:13:09,559 --> 00:13:12,560 Speaker 1: And then there's one that's labeled female novelists. So I 281 00:13:12,559 --> 00:13:15,559 Speaker 1: guess in the eighteen fifties they thought female novelists were 282 00:13:15,679 --> 00:13:16,920 Speaker 1: fat too many. 283 00:13:18,720 --> 00:13:20,720 Speaker 4: Pipe down, by the way, that was my favorite of 284 00:13:20,760 --> 00:13:23,440 Speaker 4: the three. Like every really like the consumer angle. Obviously, 285 00:13:23,520 --> 00:13:26,319 Speaker 4: it's fun to talk about the chicken sandwich warris it's interesting, 286 00:13:26,400 --> 00:13:28,640 Speaker 4: like the market structure and some of the anti trust 287 00:13:28,720 --> 00:13:31,640 Speaker 4: questions and the power. But like I do think like 288 00:13:31,760 --> 00:13:36,040 Speaker 4: one of the great sources of wealth in modern society 289 00:13:36,200 --> 00:13:40,400 Speaker 4: is abundant access to fairly and expensive protein. And the 290 00:13:40,480 --> 00:13:45,079 Speaker 4: story of the chicken getting plumper and plumper, the antibiotics 291 00:13:45,280 --> 00:13:47,120 Speaker 4: that are used to keep them alive and keep them 292 00:13:47,160 --> 00:13:50,720 Speaker 4: growing and avoid sickness, the sort of feeding mechanisms and 293 00:13:50,760 --> 00:13:52,480 Speaker 4: so forth that have turned the sort of scrawny bird 294 00:13:52,520 --> 00:13:53,920 Speaker 4: the trace you was talking to in a sort of 295 00:13:54,160 --> 00:13:57,160 Speaker 4: very tasty bird. Like to me, that's like, that's riveting, 296 00:13:57,240 --> 00:14:01,880 Speaker 4: that's exciting. That's progress, right, futures to make it more yeah, right, 297 00:14:01,880 --> 00:14:04,320 Speaker 4: and the soybet futures, which of course are crucial, which 298 00:14:04,320 --> 00:14:06,480 Speaker 4: we really like. That's the thing we could have done, Like, 299 00:14:06,520 --> 00:14:10,000 Speaker 4: because chicken is so good, we could have done episodes 300 00:14:10,040 --> 00:14:13,480 Speaker 4: on feed futures. Because chicken is just so inherently connected 301 00:14:13,480 --> 00:14:14,080 Speaker 4: to everything else. 302 00:14:14,120 --> 00:14:16,800 Speaker 1: This could have been like a twelve part series easily. 303 00:14:16,960 --> 00:14:18,520 Speaker 3: I think I was gonna say, you've got to get 304 00:14:18,559 --> 00:14:19,240 Speaker 3: Raydally on. 305 00:14:19,600 --> 00:14:23,880 Speaker 1: Yeah, well in a book more Victorian chicken bubble, the 306 00:14:23,960 --> 00:14:30,040 Speaker 1: grain market that underpins chicken nuggets. 307 00:14:41,680 --> 00:14:44,000 Speaker 2: Wait, I one time with the market structure. Yeah, there's 308 00:14:44,000 --> 00:14:46,400 Speaker 2: an episode and essentially like how chicken is like uber 309 00:14:46,520 --> 00:14:50,080 Speaker 2: where yeah, like the farmers who farm the chickens don't 310 00:14:50,080 --> 00:14:54,720 Speaker 2: own the chickens. They're outsourced from like these big they 311 00:14:54,760 --> 00:14:57,400 Speaker 2: call them integrators, like Tyson and Perdue, where they like 312 00:14:57,880 --> 00:15:02,120 Speaker 2: the integrators deliver hours old chicks to the farmers. The 313 00:15:02,160 --> 00:15:04,640 Speaker 2: farmers take care of them for a couple of weeks, 314 00:15:04,880 --> 00:15:07,360 Speaker 2: and then the integrators take them back and turn them 315 00:15:07,360 --> 00:15:08,640 Speaker 2: into chicken nuggets. 316 00:15:09,000 --> 00:15:11,520 Speaker 1: Why is it like that, That's a really good question. 317 00:15:11,600 --> 00:15:14,480 Speaker 1: I think it's just like an outcrop of the way 318 00:15:14,520 --> 00:15:17,000 Speaker 1: the chicken industry evolved. By the way, I have an 319 00:15:17,200 --> 00:15:20,120 Speaker 1: interesting fact if you don't know, chickens can still be 320 00:15:20,200 --> 00:15:23,280 Speaker 1: sent live through the US mail, So you can live 321 00:15:23,440 --> 00:15:26,840 Speaker 1: order baby chikes. No, but I don't really want to. 322 00:15:26,960 --> 00:15:30,160 Speaker 1: I would rather go to like a local agriculture tractor 323 00:15:30,200 --> 00:15:33,240 Speaker 1: and get yeah, exactly. But anyway, so the way it 324 00:15:33,280 --> 00:15:36,440 Speaker 1: worked is in the sort of nineteen twenties nineteen thirties, 325 00:15:36,720 --> 00:15:40,520 Speaker 1: we started getting these big broiler houses. So people discovered 326 00:15:40,600 --> 00:15:43,720 Speaker 1: this is actually one of Joe's favorite stories. The woman 327 00:15:43,760 --> 00:15:44,360 Speaker 1: in Delaware. 328 00:15:44,440 --> 00:15:46,400 Speaker 4: Well, yeah, there was a woman in Delaware who had 329 00:15:46,400 --> 00:15:50,120 Speaker 4: a great names to Seal Long Steal, and she ordered 330 00:15:50,160 --> 00:15:52,120 Speaker 4: what she ordered one hundred chickens. 331 00:15:51,760 --> 00:15:53,280 Speaker 1: And ever it was like ten chicks. 332 00:15:53,400 --> 00:15:56,000 Speaker 4: She ordered like ten chicks in the mail and accidentally 333 00:15:56,080 --> 00:15:57,960 Speaker 4: ordered a thousand. So she's like, all right, I guess 334 00:15:57,960 --> 00:15:58,640 Speaker 4: I'm gonna become. 335 00:15:58,480 --> 00:15:59,920 Speaker 3: A farm that never happens to me. 336 00:16:00,400 --> 00:16:02,680 Speaker 4: No, it doesn't happen to me either. The point about 337 00:16:02,720 --> 00:16:05,720 Speaker 4: uber and so then people get into the farming, they're like, oh, 338 00:16:05,920 --> 00:16:08,200 Speaker 4: I like the idea of farming, and it doesn't seem 339 00:16:08,240 --> 00:16:10,560 Speaker 4: that bad to be a chicken farmer. But like they're 340 00:16:10,640 --> 00:16:15,280 Speaker 4: extremely highly constrained. The integrators they deliver them the chickens, 341 00:16:15,440 --> 00:16:19,120 Speaker 4: They tell them the exact specifications of the barn, the temperature, 342 00:16:19,280 --> 00:16:22,640 Speaker 4: the feed, how much feed, and so forth, and then 343 00:16:22,840 --> 00:16:25,560 Speaker 4: they compete against each other in what's called the tournament system. 344 00:16:25,720 --> 00:16:28,640 Speaker 1: Yeah, so you as the farmer, are actually responsible for 345 00:16:28,760 --> 00:16:31,720 Speaker 1: a lot of the capital investments that are needed to 346 00:16:31,960 --> 00:16:37,479 Speaker 1: raise chickens. Meanwhile, the big integrators like a Tyson or Purdue, 347 00:16:37,760 --> 00:16:40,720 Speaker 1: they provide a lot of the inputs. So the baby 348 00:16:40,760 --> 00:16:43,920 Speaker 1: chicks themselves. They'll tell you what medicines to use, what 349 00:16:44,080 --> 00:16:47,120 Speaker 1: kind of food, and so in the eyes of the farmers, 350 00:16:47,200 --> 00:16:49,640 Speaker 1: they feel like they are absorbing a lot of the 351 00:16:49,640 --> 00:16:52,160 Speaker 1: big risks here while not really having a lot of 352 00:16:52,200 --> 00:16:56,200 Speaker 1: control over stuff that ultimately affects the end product. 353 00:16:56,440 --> 00:16:59,280 Speaker 4: And then the tournament is you have this pool of 354 00:16:59,320 --> 00:17:03,160 Speaker 4: farmers in an area, and your pay for some period 355 00:17:03,520 --> 00:17:07,800 Speaker 4: is how far above or below the average of that pool. 356 00:17:08,000 --> 00:17:09,520 Speaker 1: Yeah, you're pitted against each other. 357 00:17:09,520 --> 00:17:11,920 Speaker 4: You pitted against each other. There's like a fixed pot 358 00:17:12,200 --> 00:17:15,320 Speaker 4: and then each round, you know, some people had the 359 00:17:15,320 --> 00:17:17,919 Speaker 4: best chick OUs or the heaviest chickens or whatever it is, 360 00:17:18,280 --> 00:17:20,320 Speaker 4: and some had the worst and so forth. And so 361 00:17:20,600 --> 00:17:24,720 Speaker 4: it's very constrained type of farming. If you imagine farming 362 00:17:24,760 --> 00:17:28,080 Speaker 4: in Iowa in some idyllic sense, which I think some 363 00:17:28,119 --> 00:17:30,040 Speaker 4: people still do, but I think we also know it's 364 00:17:30,040 --> 00:17:32,560 Speaker 4: big in dushow business, it's not that vision. 365 00:17:32,800 --> 00:17:36,000 Speaker 2: Yeah, it's sort of like retailers like not there, they're 366 00:17:36,040 --> 00:17:38,399 Speaker 2: real estate. It's like it's like weird that like the 367 00:17:38,880 --> 00:17:42,240 Speaker 2: capital requirement comes from the you know, individual small farmers 368 00:17:42,240 --> 00:17:45,440 Speaker 2: and like these big companies are making the capital investments. 369 00:17:45,520 --> 00:17:49,119 Speaker 1: It seems to be a super beneficial way of structuring 370 00:17:49,160 --> 00:17:51,960 Speaker 1: their business for the big companies, right, you could see 371 00:17:52,000 --> 00:17:55,400 Speaker 1: why they like it. And by the way, like that light, yeah, 372 00:17:55,560 --> 00:17:58,359 Speaker 1: that's exactly it. And they will argue that like actually 373 00:17:58,760 --> 00:18:01,840 Speaker 1: providing the initial round of chicks and the food and 374 00:18:01,880 --> 00:18:04,920 Speaker 1: the medicine is like a big cost center and they 375 00:18:04,960 --> 00:18:07,760 Speaker 1: are taking that on. But again, like all the farmers 376 00:18:07,800 --> 00:18:09,840 Speaker 1: we spoke to had pretty similar complaints. 377 00:18:09,880 --> 00:18:11,880 Speaker 2: Right, It's not like uber, it's not like literally they're 378 00:18:11,920 --> 00:18:14,159 Speaker 2: just like you know, like a matching app like they 379 00:18:14,200 --> 00:18:14,760 Speaker 2: have a lot of. 380 00:18:14,840 --> 00:18:17,359 Speaker 4: Yeah, that's right, that's right. But you know sometimes like 381 00:18:17,359 --> 00:18:19,440 Speaker 4: when Uber is like you could like be an entrepreneur, 382 00:18:19,520 --> 00:18:21,200 Speaker 4: you know, like they pitch it that, but in the end, 383 00:18:21,680 --> 00:18:25,280 Speaker 4: the rules of the business are heavily constrained and it's 384 00:18:25,320 --> 00:18:27,800 Speaker 4: all within the context of Uber and policy changes that 385 00:18:27,880 --> 00:18:31,119 Speaker 4: Uber can make, et cetera. It's similar to that in 386 00:18:31,160 --> 00:18:33,520 Speaker 4: that there's a cap on one's ability to be sort 387 00:18:33,560 --> 00:18:36,320 Speaker 4: of like actually a business owner. The sentence like even 388 00:18:36,359 --> 00:18:37,440 Speaker 4: how constrained. 389 00:18:36,960 --> 00:18:39,320 Speaker 2: It is, Oh, you can be a farmer, you can like, yeah, farm, 390 00:18:39,359 --> 00:18:41,439 Speaker 2: but it's like no, really, you're just like following their orders. 391 00:18:41,760 --> 00:18:45,600 Speaker 1: Speaking of Uber, it also gets to something else in 392 00:18:45,640 --> 00:18:48,920 Speaker 1: the modern US economy, which is sort of the prevalence 393 00:18:49,119 --> 00:18:52,040 Speaker 1: of the middleman and the power that they wield over 394 00:18:52,080 --> 00:18:57,439 Speaker 1: the economy. So Uber basically matches passengers with drivers, and 395 00:18:57,480 --> 00:19:00,199 Speaker 1: it makes a lot of money from doing that. If 396 00:19:00,200 --> 00:19:03,080 Speaker 1: you look at the farming industry, for every dollar that 397 00:19:03,160 --> 00:19:06,760 Speaker 1: comes out of agriculture, farmers get like twenty cents. The 398 00:19:06,840 --> 00:19:10,080 Speaker 1: other eighty cents is going to someone else, and a 399 00:19:10,200 --> 00:19:13,040 Speaker 1: lot of the someone else turns out to be middleman, 400 00:19:13,240 --> 00:19:16,639 Speaker 1: like the you know, the distribution networks, the integrators in 401 00:19:16,680 --> 00:19:18,919 Speaker 1: some respect the packaging things like that. 402 00:19:19,080 --> 00:19:22,640 Speaker 4: And there's the role of the pricing algorithm setting oh yeah, pitty. 403 00:19:22,720 --> 00:19:24,560 Speaker 4: So this is really interesting because we talked to all 404 00:19:24,600 --> 00:19:26,760 Speaker 4: these like anti trust experts, et cetera, and they are 405 00:19:26,800 --> 00:19:30,840 Speaker 4: like various targets for the integrators themselves, whether they're uncompetitive things. 406 00:19:30,880 --> 00:19:33,520 Speaker 4: And this has come up over the years. But another 407 00:19:33,600 --> 00:19:36,760 Speaker 4: thing that's come up across a range of industries, again 408 00:19:37,000 --> 00:19:40,639 Speaker 4: chicken as the lens to uncover other aspects of the economy, 409 00:19:40,800 --> 00:19:46,000 Speaker 4: is can you have tacit price setting systems not via 410 00:19:46,280 --> 00:19:50,480 Speaker 4: people getting in a smoke filled room and doing nefarious things, 411 00:19:50,520 --> 00:19:54,880 Speaker 4: but via a third party pricing entity that everyone uses 412 00:19:54,960 --> 00:19:58,359 Speaker 4: as some agreed upon oracle. And people make this claim 413 00:19:58,400 --> 00:20:01,399 Speaker 4: and all kinds of different industries these days. And again 414 00:20:01,480 --> 00:20:04,840 Speaker 4: I'm not an anti trust lawyer expert. I don't have 415 00:20:04,880 --> 00:20:07,639 Speaker 4: a view on this, but it is certainly one area 416 00:20:07,680 --> 00:20:10,359 Speaker 4: that the anti trust focused people are like eager to 417 00:20:10,400 --> 00:20:11,520 Speaker 4: sink their chief into. 418 00:20:12,040 --> 00:20:15,440 Speaker 2: We talked about this on our podcast about farmers markets, 419 00:20:15,720 --> 00:20:19,040 Speaker 2: because there's like a Cornell project that like gives basically 420 00:20:19,080 --> 00:20:22,520 Speaker 2: like market price information to people running stalls at farmers markets. 421 00:20:22,800 --> 00:20:26,240 Speaker 2: And I sort of jokingly suggest that that that is 422 00:20:26,320 --> 00:20:28,159 Speaker 2: analogous to like, you know, the dj I brought a 423 00:20:28,200 --> 00:20:30,159 Speaker 2: case against the real page in the rental business, and 424 00:20:30,200 --> 00:20:32,600 Speaker 2: then you talk about they brought a case against acrostats 425 00:20:32,600 --> 00:20:34,439 Speaker 2: and the sort of big agriculture. 426 00:20:33,920 --> 00:20:38,240 Speaker 1: Business working beneath every antitrust case is a discussion over 427 00:20:38,280 --> 00:20:41,359 Speaker 1: whether you're actually breaking the law or it's it's just 428 00:20:41,400 --> 00:20:41,919 Speaker 1: good business. 429 00:20:42,040 --> 00:20:43,560 Speaker 2: Right. It's wild because it's like, you know, in the 430 00:20:43,640 --> 00:20:45,639 Speaker 2: olden days, like you'd get together in a room and 431 00:20:45,680 --> 00:20:47,080 Speaker 2: you'd be like, ah, these are our prices, these are 432 00:20:47,119 --> 00:20:50,120 Speaker 2: our prices, and you'd like wink or whatever, and yeah, 433 00:20:50,400 --> 00:20:53,639 Speaker 2: we've agreed to set prices here. There's no like explicit agreement. 434 00:20:53,680 --> 00:20:55,960 Speaker 2: But it's just like if everyone has each other's prices, Yeah, 435 00:20:56,000 --> 00:20:58,200 Speaker 2: then there is an argument that I'm not really sure 436 00:20:58,200 --> 00:21:00,280 Speaker 2: it's true. It seems to be true. Yeah, there's an 437 00:21:00,359 --> 00:21:03,080 Speaker 2: argument that that like allows them all creating mechanism. Yeah, 438 00:21:03,080 --> 00:21:05,200 Speaker 2: it's a coordinating mechanism. If I know everyone's prices, I 439 00:21:05,200 --> 00:21:07,440 Speaker 2: can undercut everyone by a penny and I can gain 440 00:21:07,520 --> 00:21:09,959 Speaker 2: market share. And that doesn't seem to be I know. 441 00:21:10,080 --> 00:21:13,879 Speaker 4: The question is in some of these instances, whether you 442 00:21:13,920 --> 00:21:17,080 Speaker 4: get penalized or whether Now I don't have any idea. 443 00:21:17,359 --> 00:21:19,359 Speaker 4: I do not know whether this ever came up in 444 00:21:19,400 --> 00:21:23,240 Speaker 4: the Agristats claim in some of the interests in Agristats. 445 00:21:23,359 --> 00:21:26,000 Speaker 4: But isn't one of the arguments, at least in real 446 00:21:26,080 --> 00:21:29,800 Speaker 4: page that some of the allegations or that there was 447 00:21:29,840 --> 00:21:33,040 Speaker 4: some penalty to landlords who deviated, or that there was 448 00:21:33,119 --> 00:21:33,920 Speaker 4: some right. 449 00:21:33,960 --> 00:21:35,560 Speaker 2: I don't think it's quite that, But I think that 450 00:21:35,680 --> 00:21:37,760 Speaker 2: that real page is both like providing the information and 451 00:21:37,760 --> 00:21:41,200 Speaker 2: also providing a prising recommendation, and so real page pushes 452 00:21:41,280 --> 00:21:44,760 Speaker 2: those Okay, let's say, but if you're providing pure information, 453 00:21:45,520 --> 00:21:47,480 Speaker 2: I think if I have. 454 00:21:47,520 --> 00:21:49,639 Speaker 4: An s P y E. T. If I'm gonna look 455 00:21:49,680 --> 00:21:52,239 Speaker 4: at the ticker on the Bloomberg terminal first before I 456 00:21:52,320 --> 00:21:53,760 Speaker 4: sell it, right, you'll. 457 00:21:53,600 --> 00:21:54,439 Speaker 1: Do market research? 458 00:21:54,520 --> 00:21:54,720 Speaker 2: Yeah? 459 00:21:54,800 --> 00:21:56,879 Speaker 4: Yeah, did that actually happen in the old day? Like 460 00:21:56,920 --> 00:21:58,160 Speaker 4: people like a smoke filled room? 461 00:21:58,200 --> 00:21:58,440 Speaker 2: Wink? 462 00:21:58,480 --> 00:22:01,399 Speaker 4: Like did that really happen? Or is that just a 463 00:22:01,640 --> 00:22:04,080 Speaker 4: metaphor that we use to describe coordinators? 464 00:22:04,119 --> 00:22:05,439 Speaker 1: Are you asking that if you miss there? 465 00:22:05,680 --> 00:22:10,000 Speaker 2: As a lawyer, the most famous cartel is Opek where 466 00:22:10,000 --> 00:22:11,880 Speaker 2: they meet in the room, right, And there have been 467 00:22:12,680 --> 00:22:16,400 Speaker 2: recent cases, you know, like the FTC is a little 468 00:22:16,400 --> 00:22:19,760 Speaker 2: concerned about some like us shell producers go into those 469 00:22:19,800 --> 00:22:22,119 Speaker 2: meetings and like there's like a dinner, and like was 470 00:22:22,160 --> 00:22:24,720 Speaker 2: the dinner to discuss raising prices or not? Like the 471 00:22:24,720 --> 00:22:27,280 Speaker 2: people say no, the SEC says yes. It's like a 472 00:22:27,280 --> 00:22:29,800 Speaker 2: little there was definitely a dinner. What did they talk 473 00:22:29,840 --> 00:22:32,160 Speaker 2: about at the dinner? There's a famous story and I'm 474 00:22:32,160 --> 00:22:34,440 Speaker 2: not forgetting on where it was. There's a famous story 475 00:22:34,440 --> 00:22:36,680 Speaker 2: of a company like there was a formal policy that 476 00:22:36,720 --> 00:22:38,320 Speaker 2: they would say, we are not going to collude to 477 00:22:38,320 --> 00:22:41,399 Speaker 2: the competitors, and then they'd wink say they were, and 478 00:22:41,440 --> 00:22:43,640 Speaker 2: then like they sent out a memo or like there's 479 00:22:43,680 --> 00:22:45,840 Speaker 2: like a recording of someone saying I didn't wink. Like 480 00:22:46,200 --> 00:22:49,200 Speaker 2: it's like it's like a famous story an antidress enforcement. 481 00:22:50,240 --> 00:22:55,160 Speaker 1: But Matt, to your point your point earlier about like, Okay, 482 00:22:55,200 --> 00:22:57,320 Speaker 1: if you could see everyone's prices, or you have like 483 00:22:57,359 --> 00:23:00,119 Speaker 1: a rough guideline about what's going on with prices, why 484 00:23:00,160 --> 00:23:03,000 Speaker 1: don't you just undercut your competitors. This is something that 485 00:23:03,040 --> 00:23:05,800 Speaker 1: we talk about in the first episode when we're talking 486 00:23:05,840 --> 00:23:09,240 Speaker 1: about the consumer experience and inflation, and the answer is, well, 487 00:23:09,280 --> 00:23:11,879 Speaker 1: if you only have a handful of big companies that 488 00:23:11,960 --> 00:23:14,800 Speaker 1: are doing this. You know, first of all, the incentive 489 00:23:15,160 --> 00:23:18,240 Speaker 1: is not necessarily necessarily there to try to get into 490 00:23:18,240 --> 00:23:21,600 Speaker 1: a price war. This is the classic like antitrust argument. 491 00:23:21,680 --> 00:23:24,760 Speaker 1: If you consolidate companies, then they raise their prices they 492 00:23:24,760 --> 00:23:27,800 Speaker 1: have more market power. But there's another aspect going on 493 00:23:28,080 --> 00:23:30,000 Speaker 1: in the past few years, which is, we had the 494 00:23:30,000 --> 00:23:34,000 Speaker 1: big pandemic, we had avian flu, we had labor shortages, 495 00:23:34,240 --> 00:23:38,040 Speaker 1: we had all these massive, one off specific events. And 496 00:23:38,160 --> 00:23:41,479 Speaker 1: when that happens, you know, consumers hear about them. And 497 00:23:41,560 --> 00:23:44,280 Speaker 1: so if companies say, well, we have to raise our 498 00:23:44,320 --> 00:23:47,600 Speaker 1: prices because of avian flu or because of the pandemic, 499 00:23:48,040 --> 00:23:51,720 Speaker 1: consumers are more willing to kind of accept that, and 500 00:23:51,760 --> 00:23:54,879 Speaker 1: they have fewer alternatives. Right, if everyone is doing it 501 00:23:54,920 --> 00:23:59,080 Speaker 1: at the same time because of these same like exogenous shocks, 502 00:23:59,640 --> 00:24:01,840 Speaker 1: then where are you going to go to get cheap 503 00:24:01,840 --> 00:24:06,920 Speaker 1: eggs or chickens. 504 00:24:08,440 --> 00:24:12,040 Speaker 2: Check out Beak Capitalism on the Odd Lots podcast feed 505 00:24:12,520 --> 00:24:24,280 Speaker 2: wherever you get your podcasts. Do you guys know about 506 00:24:24,280 --> 00:24:24,960 Speaker 2: the Georgia dock? 507 00:24:26,320 --> 00:24:30,880 Speaker 1: No like doc like dck. This rings a bell. Actually 508 00:24:31,040 --> 00:24:31,560 Speaker 1: I wrote it. 509 00:24:31,359 --> 00:24:33,000 Speaker 2: It was years ago, and I don't know if it's 510 00:24:33,000 --> 00:24:36,320 Speaker 2: still a thing. There have been like periodic waves of 511 00:24:36,359 --> 00:24:40,320 Speaker 2: antitrust interest in the chicken industry, And there was one 512 00:24:40,359 --> 00:24:43,280 Speaker 2: in like twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen that I used to 513 00:24:43,359 --> 00:24:46,920 Speaker 2: refer to as chicken libor. There's a thing an index 514 00:24:47,080 --> 00:24:50,480 Speaker 2: called the Georgia doc Index, which was set by a 515 00:24:50,520 --> 00:24:53,080 Speaker 2: guy his name was Ardie Schwantz. He worked for the 516 00:24:53,119 --> 00:24:55,720 Speaker 2: like Georgia Department of Agriculture or whatever, and he would 517 00:24:55,720 --> 00:24:59,080 Speaker 2: call chicken producers every day, every week or whatever and say, 518 00:24:59,440 --> 00:25:01,320 Speaker 2: what price you're getting for like two and a half 519 00:25:01,320 --> 00:25:03,639 Speaker 2: pound chickens, which, as I learned from your podcast, no 520 00:25:03,640 --> 00:25:05,480 Speaker 2: one produces two and a half pound chickens anymore. So 521 00:25:05,600 --> 00:25:07,640 Speaker 2: the people would like make up a number and they'd 522 00:25:07,640 --> 00:25:09,719 Speaker 2: tell him the number and he'd write it down and 523 00:25:09,720 --> 00:25:12,120 Speaker 2: that would go into the Georgia doc Index. And then 524 00:25:12,160 --> 00:25:14,440 Speaker 2: a lot of like chicken supply contracts were set as 525 00:25:14,480 --> 00:25:14,919 Speaker 2: like a you. 526 00:25:14,920 --> 00:25:18,600 Speaker 4: Know opinion, they were pushing it up so like. 527 00:25:18,920 --> 00:25:21,720 Speaker 2: There were allegations that they were, you know, reporting two 528 00:25:21,760 --> 00:25:25,280 Speaker 2: high prices to. 529 00:25:24,400 --> 00:25:26,840 Speaker 1: Have another episode for our twelve part series. 530 00:25:27,880 --> 00:25:32,120 Speaker 4: Interesting over the years, you learn like how many indices 531 00:25:32,240 --> 00:25:35,160 Speaker 4: that exist that you can find a chart of are 532 00:25:35,280 --> 00:25:38,800 Speaker 4: essentially put together like this years ago, probably about like 533 00:25:38,880 --> 00:25:40,760 Speaker 4: nine years ago. I remember talking to someone who's working 534 00:25:41,000 --> 00:25:44,159 Speaker 4: at Bloomberg actually, and there was like some scrap metal 535 00:25:44,520 --> 00:25:46,640 Speaker 4: interdex and it was just like you called there were 536 00:25:46,680 --> 00:25:49,320 Speaker 4: like a handful of junk metal yards that you call 537 00:25:49,400 --> 00:25:51,080 Speaker 4: up and then you get the price. Actually, you know 538 00:25:51,160 --> 00:25:54,040 Speaker 4: speaking of Another one is lumber. And what's really interesting, 539 00:25:54,119 --> 00:25:57,040 Speaker 4: so the company that creates the lumber index, I think 540 00:25:57,040 --> 00:25:59,800 Speaker 4: it's called Random Lengths actually, and they're the ones you 541 00:26:00,200 --> 00:26:03,120 Speaker 4: the benchmark futures. They also have a very interesting thing. 542 00:26:03,160 --> 00:26:05,200 Speaker 4: So they do this they call various places how much 543 00:26:05,240 --> 00:26:06,960 Speaker 4: did you sell a piece of lumber for each day? 544 00:26:07,160 --> 00:26:09,679 Speaker 4: And then what's actually cool is you can read the 545 00:26:09,720 --> 00:26:13,400 Speaker 4: contract and they talk about all of the ethical things 546 00:26:13,480 --> 00:26:16,280 Speaker 4: that like the rules of the question, because they are 547 00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:20,240 Speaker 4: aware that all indices such as these create situations potentially 548 00:26:20,280 --> 00:26:22,639 Speaker 4: like Georgia docks or libar, and so they actually have 549 00:26:22,680 --> 00:26:25,920 Speaker 4: a whole set of rules about the collection process. The 550 00:26:25,960 --> 00:26:27,720 Speaker 4: addresses basically exactly this question. 551 00:26:27,920 --> 00:26:29,920 Speaker 3: I thought you were going to bring up the dog 552 00:26:30,040 --> 00:26:30,880 Speaker 3: kill index. 553 00:26:30,960 --> 00:26:32,560 Speaker 4: That's obsession. 554 00:26:32,640 --> 00:26:34,960 Speaker 3: But I don't think anyone is pushing up the price 555 00:26:35,200 --> 00:26:36,720 Speaker 3: of that benchmarkard. 556 00:26:36,200 --> 00:26:38,800 Speaker 1: This this is one of our questions at a recent 557 00:26:39,640 --> 00:26:43,440 Speaker 1: quiz was like, which of these indexes is actually real? 558 00:26:43,800 --> 00:26:46,359 Speaker 1: Which of these terminal indexes? And the one that was 559 00:26:46,359 --> 00:26:50,120 Speaker 1: real was the dog kill index. Almost no one got that, right, Yeah, 560 00:26:50,160 --> 00:26:53,679 Speaker 1: that's no one believes that that actually exists. You know, 561 00:26:53,720 --> 00:26:57,640 Speaker 1: we used to have a Columbia Oh yeah, so it's 562 00:26:57,640 --> 00:27:00,880 Speaker 1: basically the number of dogs that die in the possession 563 00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:05,600 Speaker 1: of airplanes when they're in air transit. I know. But 564 00:27:05,800 --> 00:27:08,879 Speaker 1: speaking of the cob indexes, we used to have a 565 00:27:08,920 --> 00:27:13,760 Speaker 1: Columbia kidnapping index too, but I think they discontinued that 566 00:27:12,440 --> 00:27:16,960 Speaker 1: once died down a bit some deep lore. 567 00:27:17,119 --> 00:27:23,359 Speaker 3: I do want to talk about the price of eggs more, because, yeah, 568 00:27:23,560 --> 00:27:26,639 Speaker 3: well it's sort of become one of, at least in 569 00:27:26,680 --> 00:27:29,560 Speaker 3: my circles, one of the most watched indexes, because you 570 00:27:29,600 --> 00:27:32,600 Speaker 3: talk about inflation, and the thing that people complain about 571 00:27:33,160 --> 00:27:36,520 Speaker 3: is gas and eggs. And I mean, Tracy, you were 572 00:27:36,520 --> 00:27:40,280 Speaker 3: mentioning that there's well explained reasons why the price of 573 00:27:40,280 --> 00:27:43,639 Speaker 3: eggs has been so volatile, bird flu being one of them, 574 00:27:43,680 --> 00:27:46,080 Speaker 3: and I'm never quite sure we are in the cycle 575 00:27:46,119 --> 00:27:49,199 Speaker 3: of bird flu because it's an issue, and then it 576 00:27:49,200 --> 00:27:51,200 Speaker 3: feels like it died down again. Now we're talking about 577 00:27:51,240 --> 00:27:53,959 Speaker 3: bird flu again, and I just don't know where we 578 00:27:54,040 --> 00:27:56,720 Speaker 3: are in terms of how worried I should be about 579 00:27:56,760 --> 00:27:58,000 Speaker 3: bird flu. 580 00:27:57,920 --> 00:28:00,239 Speaker 1: Uh So when we started the series, we did not 581 00:28:00,280 --> 00:28:04,320 Speaker 1: really expect eggs to become this huge political talking point, 582 00:28:04,440 --> 00:28:07,880 Speaker 1: but they did during the election, and where we are 583 00:28:07,920 --> 00:28:10,000 Speaker 1: with bird flu. Okay, So we had a really big 584 00:28:10,080 --> 00:28:13,400 Speaker 1: spike in twenty twenty two and we saw the price 585 00:28:13,440 --> 00:28:16,440 Speaker 1: of eggs shoot up. That since died down. But if 586 00:28:16,480 --> 00:28:19,320 Speaker 1: you look at the egg price index on the Bloomberg, 587 00:28:19,359 --> 00:28:21,199 Speaker 1: there's more than one. By the way, we have a 588 00:28:21,200 --> 00:28:23,199 Speaker 1: bunch of different ones. You can see they're starting to 589 00:28:23,200 --> 00:28:25,800 Speaker 1: go back up again, and that's because we are getting 590 00:28:26,200 --> 00:28:29,200 Speaker 1: more bird flu reported. The interesting thing is we're starting 591 00:28:29,240 --> 00:28:33,160 Speaker 1: to get it in other animals too. Yeah, so you know, cows, 592 00:28:33,680 --> 00:28:37,199 Speaker 1: pigs are the really worrying one because pigs have like 593 00:28:37,400 --> 00:28:40,719 Speaker 1: a genome that is very similar to humans, and so 594 00:28:40,800 --> 00:28:42,840 Speaker 1: the concern is that if it gets into pigs, it'll 595 00:28:42,920 --> 00:28:45,800 Speaker 1: mutate into something. That was my prey. 596 00:28:45,640 --> 00:28:48,280 Speaker 3: Question, like, at what point personally I need to be 597 00:28:48,480 --> 00:28:50,280 Speaker 3: concerned about contracting bird flu. 598 00:28:50,120 --> 00:28:52,960 Speaker 1: In some way When more pigs start getting bird flu 599 00:28:53,160 --> 00:28:55,080 Speaker 1: and when it starts mutating. 600 00:28:54,840 --> 00:28:57,200 Speaker 4: Some smart people I know are like anxious. 601 00:28:57,640 --> 00:29:01,280 Speaker 1: Yeah, you need a pig mutation index on the Bloomberg terminal. 602 00:29:01,400 --> 00:29:02,560 Speaker 1: That would be really worrying. 603 00:29:02,800 --> 00:29:06,200 Speaker 3: Gotta get our best and brightest on us. That's worrisome. Well, 604 00:29:06,280 --> 00:29:08,520 Speaker 3: before I spiral, let's just keep it to like the 605 00:29:08,600 --> 00:29:12,520 Speaker 3: chicken industry, because I do wonder. I mean, how does 606 00:29:12,560 --> 00:29:15,680 Speaker 3: it spread. One of the parts that was a hard 607 00:29:15,760 --> 00:29:18,000 Speaker 3: listen when it came to this episode was listening to 608 00:29:18,080 --> 00:29:20,120 Speaker 3: I think it was Craig Watts describing how he had 609 00:29:20,160 --> 00:29:23,720 Speaker 3: like thirty thousand chickens in twenty thousand square feet. It 610 00:29:23,720 --> 00:29:26,080 Speaker 3: sounds like these birds are just on top of each other. 611 00:29:26,200 --> 00:29:29,800 Speaker 3: So I mean, how quickly does bird flu spread? And 612 00:29:29,840 --> 00:29:32,280 Speaker 3: what does that mean for the industry? 613 00:29:32,440 --> 00:29:35,120 Speaker 1: So you're right, this is one of the downsides of 614 00:29:35,200 --> 00:29:38,640 Speaker 1: industrial scale chicken farming, which is you have a lot 615 00:29:38,640 --> 00:29:42,200 Speaker 1: of birds and you have them in a relatively crowded space. 616 00:29:42,720 --> 00:29:45,480 Speaker 1: Joe has heard me tell this story before. Not many 617 00:29:45,480 --> 00:29:49,200 Speaker 1: people know that I was born in Arkansas, and so 618 00:29:49,440 --> 00:29:52,200 Speaker 1: I spent time there with my grandma and she used 619 00:29:52,200 --> 00:29:56,640 Speaker 1: to take me to like chicken farms for fun or something. 620 00:29:56,680 --> 00:29:59,120 Speaker 1: I don't know why, but I would walk into these 621 00:29:59,200 --> 00:30:02,200 Speaker 1: like giant warehouses, thinking like, oh, this is gonna be fun. 622 00:30:02,240 --> 00:30:04,800 Speaker 1: I'm going to play with like fluffy baby chicks and 623 00:30:04,920 --> 00:30:07,400 Speaker 1: I love chickens, blah blah blah. And you'd walk in 624 00:30:07,480 --> 00:30:09,880 Speaker 1: and you'd be like looking around and there are a 625 00:30:09,920 --> 00:30:13,200 Speaker 1: lot of dead chickens. They're just like lying there. You know, 626 00:30:13,240 --> 00:30:15,680 Speaker 1: they get cleaned up once a day or so, but 627 00:30:16,160 --> 00:30:19,760 Speaker 1: there's a lot. So, yeah, this is the issue. So 628 00:30:19,800 --> 00:30:24,080 Speaker 1: you have crowded conditions. It's very difficult to segregate farm 629 00:30:24,360 --> 00:30:28,600 Speaker 1: chickens from the wild bird population. Like wild birds that 630 00:30:28,680 --> 00:30:31,560 Speaker 1: have avian flu can still get in. They can eat 631 00:30:31,600 --> 00:30:34,560 Speaker 1: the grain infect it that way, and so that's one 632 00:30:34,600 --> 00:30:36,600 Speaker 1: reason why it's been really hard to stamp out. 633 00:30:37,080 --> 00:30:40,400 Speaker 4: Speaking on this point, you know, another interesting angle here 634 00:30:40,680 --> 00:30:43,400 Speaker 4: is the sort of externalities of industrial what's his name, 635 00:30:43,440 --> 00:30:45,640 Speaker 4: Austin Frerik, Yeah, one of the guys, and talk about 636 00:30:45,640 --> 00:30:48,640 Speaker 4: the waste water runoff, et cetera, and so like, Like 637 00:30:48,680 --> 00:30:52,000 Speaker 4: I said, I am an optimist about the existence of 638 00:30:52,120 --> 00:30:54,360 Speaker 4: cheap protein, and I think it's a marker of a 639 00:30:54,400 --> 00:30:58,720 Speaker 4: wealthy society. But there are some interesting costs that we 640 00:30:58,760 --> 00:31:01,720 Speaker 4: have to take seriously, and one of them is environmental 641 00:31:01,880 --> 00:31:03,840 Speaker 4: and what it does to sort of the various water 642 00:31:03,880 --> 00:31:05,880 Speaker 4: streams in some of these areas where there is a 643 00:31:05,960 --> 00:31:10,360 Speaker 4: lot of industrial farming and excrement gets in the water, 644 00:31:10,480 --> 00:31:13,920 Speaker 4: which is really bad obviously, and so there are you know, 645 00:31:13,920 --> 00:31:16,880 Speaker 4: obviously bird flu itself and the potential for that to 646 00:31:16,920 --> 00:31:18,880 Speaker 4: move into other animals is scary. But then they're also 647 00:31:18,920 --> 00:31:22,520 Speaker 4: the sort of like slower burn issues and why in 648 00:31:22,600 --> 00:31:25,520 Speaker 4: some farming communities there's been like a pushback about like 649 00:31:25,560 --> 00:31:27,719 Speaker 4: how much more of this do we want and how 650 00:31:27,800 --> 00:31:31,360 Speaker 4: much everyone else's cheap chicken is sort of slow degradation 651 00:31:31,400 --> 00:31:36,320 Speaker 4: of the environment around it. 652 00:31:34,440 --> 00:31:37,680 Speaker 1: So depressing we've left these speechless. 653 00:31:39,360 --> 00:31:43,480 Speaker 2: Is there like an artistical chicken farming oh ecosystem whereas. 654 00:31:44,840 --> 00:31:47,600 Speaker 1: Well, I mean backyard chickens would be one way. 655 00:31:48,800 --> 00:31:50,880 Speaker 2: If you go to a started by like the fanciest 656 00:31:50,920 --> 00:31:52,840 Speaker 2: chicken you can find, as it's still from a giant 657 00:31:52,880 --> 00:31:55,120 Speaker 2: warehouse or that's actually. 658 00:31:54,840 --> 00:31:58,040 Speaker 1: A good question. I know of one. Again, I'm slightly 659 00:31:58,040 --> 00:32:02,240 Speaker 1: obsessed with chickens. I know of one Avian geneticist in 660 00:32:02,360 --> 00:32:06,440 Speaker 1: the Northeast who breeds really interesting chickens, and he's sort 661 00:32:06,480 --> 00:32:08,680 Speaker 1: of like on a small scale, so maybe they do 662 00:32:08,720 --> 00:32:09,280 Speaker 1: except well. 663 00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:11,520 Speaker 3: On a slightly bigger scale. I interviewed the Sea of 664 00:32:11,600 --> 00:32:16,400 Speaker 3: Vital Farms last week, and one of their advertising points 665 00:32:16,440 --> 00:32:18,480 Speaker 3: is that it's like one hundred and seven square feet 666 00:32:18,880 --> 00:32:21,960 Speaker 3: per chicken, so that was really interesting. He also said 667 00:32:21,960 --> 00:32:24,600 Speaker 3: I thought this was interesting too on his most recent 668 00:32:24,600 --> 00:32:28,080 Speaker 3: earnings call. Our challenge right now, as always is that 669 00:32:28,120 --> 00:32:30,240 Speaker 3: I can't get the chickens to lay more eggs in 670 00:32:30,280 --> 00:32:33,000 Speaker 3: the short run, so a lot of demand and not 671 00:32:33,080 --> 00:32:36,560 Speaker 3: a lot of eggs. But I mean, that's interesting again 672 00:32:36,600 --> 00:32:39,480 Speaker 3: that they're advertising on that point that we give these 673 00:32:39,520 --> 00:32:40,800 Speaker 3: chickens all this space. 674 00:32:41,120 --> 00:32:43,360 Speaker 4: Are brown eggs just like better than white eggs? I 675 00:32:43,360 --> 00:32:45,120 Speaker 4: feel like we have they don't look as nice though. 676 00:32:45,120 --> 00:32:47,080 Speaker 4: I think people just assume they must be either better 677 00:32:47,080 --> 00:32:49,000 Speaker 4: for the environment or healthier. Is there anythink through that. 678 00:32:49,200 --> 00:32:52,400 Speaker 1: Have you seen the Easter Egger chickens. No, these are 679 00:32:52,480 --> 00:32:55,120 Speaker 1: the ones that lay eggs in all different colors, so 680 00:32:55,200 --> 00:32:57,680 Speaker 1: like blue and green, white and brown. 681 00:32:57,800 --> 00:33:02,160 Speaker 3: You my stupid cush you get them related them different? 682 00:33:02,440 --> 00:33:06,080 Speaker 1: No? No, they just do it. The one thing I 683 00:33:06,080 --> 00:33:09,160 Speaker 1: don't know is like whether one Easter Egger produces like 684 00:33:09,320 --> 00:33:12,440 Speaker 1: only green eggs and then another Easter Egger will produce 685 00:33:12,480 --> 00:33:13,600 Speaker 1: like only pink ones. 686 00:33:13,720 --> 00:33:15,920 Speaker 3: I thought that the bunny rabbits laid the easter eggs. 687 00:33:16,000 --> 00:33:19,200 Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right, Katie, thinking that. 688 00:33:20,440 --> 00:33:26,200 Speaker 3: Chickenization, I said that, right. Do other animal industries look 689 00:33:26,280 --> 00:33:28,400 Speaker 3: like this? Does the pork industry look like this? What 690 00:33:28,440 --> 00:33:31,160 Speaker 3: does the cow industry look like? Is it as depressing? 691 00:33:31,680 --> 00:33:34,600 Speaker 1: Yeah? So this is another talking point from the podcast, 692 00:33:34,640 --> 00:33:38,520 Speaker 1: which is this very you know, up until now unique 693 00:33:38,640 --> 00:33:43,000 Speaker 1: model of producing chickens where the big integrators are outsourcing 694 00:33:43,040 --> 00:33:46,240 Speaker 1: a lot of those big capital risks is becoming more 695 00:33:46,320 --> 00:33:50,800 Speaker 1: common in agriculture itself. So the big example Joe brought 696 00:33:50,800 --> 00:33:54,680 Speaker 1: this up earlier would be pig farming in Iowa. And 697 00:33:54,720 --> 00:33:58,400 Speaker 1: it gets to interesting questions in business about who should 698 00:33:58,440 --> 00:34:01,080 Speaker 1: bear the ultimate costs of business. We kind of talked 699 00:34:01,080 --> 00:34:04,040 Speaker 1: about that earlier, but again to Joe's point earlier, it 700 00:34:04,040 --> 00:34:07,960 Speaker 1: gets to interesting questions about who should bear the environmental costs. 701 00:34:08,320 --> 00:34:11,840 Speaker 1: So maybe all of America is okay with Iowa like 702 00:34:11,880 --> 00:34:15,200 Speaker 1: being responsible for raising our pigs and having to deal 703 00:34:15,239 --> 00:34:18,960 Speaker 1: with like manure runoff and stuff like that and spoiling 704 00:34:19,000 --> 00:34:21,840 Speaker 1: its water systems, but probably Iowa is not. 705 00:34:22,400 --> 00:34:25,760 Speaker 4: Can I just say, like, after having done this series, 706 00:34:26,000 --> 00:34:28,520 Speaker 4: I don't really view it as depressing I don't want 707 00:34:28,560 --> 00:34:30,719 Speaker 4: this to be seen as like, you know, some sort 708 00:34:30,760 --> 00:34:32,480 Speaker 4: of Jeremiah against. 709 00:34:32,239 --> 00:34:32,839 Speaker 1: The chicken ustry. 710 00:34:32,880 --> 00:34:35,120 Speaker 4: I just think there's a lot of interesting tensions, right, 711 00:34:35,239 --> 00:34:40,839 Speaker 4: Like there's benefits to industrial scale chicken farming. There's complicated 712 00:34:40,880 --> 00:34:46,360 Speaker 4: market aspects of industrial chicken scale farming. There's amazing consumer 713 00:34:46,440 --> 00:34:49,440 Speaker 4: outcomes like the chicken sandwich wars, and like those are 714 00:34:49,560 --> 00:34:53,600 Speaker 4: very delicious and are costs, whether it is the risk 715 00:34:53,680 --> 00:34:56,680 Speaker 4: borne by the farmers, the risk of disease, and the 716 00:34:56,760 --> 00:34:59,120 Speaker 4: risk of environment. It's a mix, right, Like I don't 717 00:34:59,160 --> 00:35:01,839 Speaker 4: but I don't pursue the whole project to be like 718 00:35:01,880 --> 00:35:04,000 Speaker 4: an anti chicken thing at all. 719 00:35:04,200 --> 00:35:07,239 Speaker 1: No, I want both the people and the chickens to 720 00:35:07,320 --> 00:35:10,520 Speaker 1: be happy. That's my version of an ideal culture. 721 00:35:10,719 --> 00:35:15,600 Speaker 3: That's like I can't as an animal freak, can't get 722 00:35:15,719 --> 00:35:19,399 Speaker 3: past the chickens and like, you know, them falling over 723 00:35:19,560 --> 00:35:23,920 Speaker 3: because like they've been yeah to this point where you 724 00:35:23,960 --> 00:35:26,040 Speaker 3: know they can't stand up straight. I don't know if 725 00:35:26,040 --> 00:35:28,080 Speaker 3: this came up in any of your discussions, but like, 726 00:35:28,160 --> 00:35:32,279 Speaker 3: where are we on lab grown chicken? Because I have 727 00:35:32,400 --> 00:35:36,480 Speaker 3: another episode that like cheap protein is great for a society, 728 00:35:36,480 --> 00:35:40,799 Speaker 3: it's the marker of a successful society. But surely there's 729 00:35:40,840 --> 00:35:45,400 Speaker 3: a way to achieve that without what's happening to these animals. 730 00:35:46,520 --> 00:35:51,600 Speaker 3: Really showing my true colors on this podcast. No, it 731 00:35:51,719 --> 00:35:54,040 Speaker 3: was for several years, and then you know. 732 00:35:54,040 --> 00:35:56,080 Speaker 1: I lovets vegetarians. 733 00:35:56,120 --> 00:35:56,400 Speaker 3: I was. 734 00:35:56,440 --> 00:35:58,480 Speaker 4: I was raised vegetarian. I had my first week when 735 00:35:58,520 --> 00:36:01,359 Speaker 4: I was age twenty four, when I moved to New York. 736 00:36:01,400 --> 00:36:02,680 Speaker 4: I was like, all right, and there's just too much 737 00:36:02,680 --> 00:36:06,040 Speaker 4: good for I didn't and I like went straight. I 738 00:36:06,080 --> 00:36:08,359 Speaker 4: was like, I tried, uh wait, what was it? 739 00:36:08,400 --> 00:36:08,880 Speaker 1: Do you remember? 740 00:36:08,960 --> 00:36:10,480 Speaker 4: So I ate a piece of sushi, which is a 741 00:36:10,480 --> 00:36:12,000 Speaker 4: little weird, just people like I was raw, but it 742 00:36:12,080 --> 00:36:13,600 Speaker 4: looked at it peel like. And then a week later 743 00:36:13,600 --> 00:36:16,520 Speaker 4: I was like eating steaks a hard launch. Yeah, it's 744 00:36:16,560 --> 00:36:19,560 Speaker 4: a hard hard launch. Yeahs were hippo. And so I 745 00:36:19,600 --> 00:36:20,480 Speaker 4: was raised vegetarian. 746 00:36:20,560 --> 00:36:25,280 Speaker 3: Yeah, I was a vegetarian for like ages eleven to fourteen. 747 00:36:25,360 --> 00:36:27,520 Speaker 3: I feel like I stunned my growth. I'm shorter than 748 00:36:27,520 --> 00:36:35,919 Speaker 3: both my parents, but anyway, it doesn't matter your podcast, Thanks. 749 00:36:33,360 --> 00:36:34,600 Speaker 2: For coming on, guys, Thanks. 750 00:36:34,440 --> 00:36:35,399 Speaker 4: For having us. That was black. 751 00:36:35,520 --> 00:36:37,800 Speaker 1: Yeah, thank you for letting us talk about chicken. 752 00:36:37,840 --> 00:36:40,960 Speaker 3: No one made a chicken sound or a pun yeah. 753 00:36:40,880 --> 00:36:42,239 Speaker 1: No, you made one, pun I did. 754 00:36:42,360 --> 00:36:42,600 Speaker 3: Yeah. 755 00:36:42,800 --> 00:36:43,759 Speaker 1: I was very proud of me. 756 00:36:43,800 --> 00:36:44,319 Speaker 4: What did I say? 757 00:36:44,400 --> 00:36:49,960 Speaker 1: I can't remember, but you did make one? 758 00:36:51,000 --> 00:36:52,440 Speaker 2: And that was the Money Stuff Podcast. 759 00:36:52,600 --> 00:36:54,759 Speaker 3: I'm Matlvi and I'm Katie Greifeld. 760 00:36:54,960 --> 00:36:57,040 Speaker 2: You can find my work by subscribing to the money 761 00:36:57,040 --> 00:36:58,880 Speaker 2: Stuff newsletter on Bloomberg dot. 762 00:36:58,680 --> 00:37:01,399 Speaker 3: Com, and you can find me on Bloomberg TV every 763 00:37:01,520 --> 00:37:04,880 Speaker 3: day on Open Interest between nine to eleven am Eastern. 764 00:37:05,080 --> 00:37:06,759 Speaker 2: We'd love to hear from you. You can send an 765 00:37:06,800 --> 00:37:10,000 Speaker 2: email to Moneypot at Bloomberg dot net, ask us a 766 00:37:10,080 --> 00:37:11,440 Speaker 2: question and we might answer it on air. 767 00:37:11,600 --> 00:37:13,760 Speaker 3: You can also subscribe to our show wherever you're listening 768 00:37:13,800 --> 00:37:15,799 Speaker 3: right now and leave us a review. It helps more 769 00:37:15,840 --> 00:37:16,719 Speaker 3: people find the show. 770 00:37:17,080 --> 00:37:20,320 Speaker 2: The Money Stuff Podcast is produced by Anamasarakus and Moses 771 00:37:20,320 --> 00:37:20,880 Speaker 2: ondem Our. 772 00:37:20,920 --> 00:37:23,840 Speaker 3: Theme music was composed by Blake Maples. Special thanks this 773 00:37:23,880 --> 00:37:25,840 Speaker 3: week to Carmen Rodriguez. 774 00:37:25,760 --> 00:37:28,399 Speaker 2: Brandon Francis Newnim is our executive producer, and. 775 00:37:28,360 --> 00:37:30,400 Speaker 3: Sage Bauman is Bloomberg's head of Podcasts. 776 00:37:30,480 --> 00:37:32,840 Speaker 2: Thanks for listening to the Money Stuff Podcast. We'll be 777 00:37:32,880 --> 00:37:34,440 Speaker 2: back next week with Mars Stuff. 778 00:37:45,200 --> 00:37:47,719 Speaker 3: Thanks for listening to The Money Stuff Podcast. If you 779 00:37:47,840 --> 00:37:49,960 Speaker 3: never want to miss a story. Become a bloomberg dot 780 00:37:50,040 --> 00:37:53,440 Speaker 3: com subscriber today. Check out our special intro offer right 781 00:37:53,480 --> 00:37:56,839 Speaker 3: now at bloomberg dot com slash podcast offer or click 782 00:37:56,880 --> 00:37:59,480 Speaker 3: the link in our show notes. You also unlock deep 783 00:37:59,520 --> 00:38:02,200 Speaker 3: reporting data and analysis from reporters around the world.