Prop 2 Aftermath: Quit Worrying. California Egg Industry Was Dead Before Prop 2

[Guest Blogger and Giant Sturgeon Wrestler, Col. Erik R. Sanderz Poulet IV disagrees with our hand wringing over the fate of California Chicken farmers in the aftermath of Prop. 2]

One thing that hasn’t been a part of the Prop 2 discussion, is that California’s Egg Industry is already dying, and has been doing so for decades.  The best years of egg production in California were back in the 50′s, and since then, long before Prop 2, California’s population growth, ever multiplying land use restrictions and rising land costs caused a long, slow slide to oblivion for the state’s egg producers.

Producing eggs takes lots of space and lots of equipment, and the profit margin is TINY. Doing it in California at this point is nearly impossible, Prop 2 or not.

For example, in order to survive, chicken farmers have had to find out through scientific research exactly how little light they can give a chicken in order for its physiological system to register “daylight” You can’t actually see without a flashlight in this light. They also measure exactly how much of which nutrient must be included by percentage weight in the feed (and no more or the cost overrun will put you out of business).  At this point, almost everything is automated, with only a handful of employees (like less than ten) on hand per farm to put out millions of eggs.

Prop 2 may indeed be the final nail in the coffin, but it’s a coffin that has been assembled over decades, with the major factors being rising land prices and population growth across the state.

Although I did and do support prop 2, I also empathize with the farmers. They’re good, hardworking people who are stuck between a rock and a hard place. I firmly believe the unpleasant conditions their animals endure are forced on them by the market, and not because farmers are cruel, inhumane people.

My problem with opposing Prop 2 is that I don’t believe the market will ever bring about an improvement in domestic animal welfare on it’s own. The market won’t allow these guys to do any better by their animals. At this point, I think the system is broken, and although fixes like Prop 2 are not perfect, they are better than allowing the status quo to continue.

I’m not a vegetarian. I eat meat, and I know where my meat comes from. I’ve even worked on an aquaculture ranch and had to wrestle and put down sick sturgeon nearly the same size as me. I don’t think it’s wrong to eat meat, and I would kill my own food if I had to. But, animal welfare conditions in the modern meat production industry have become too horrible not to act, in my opinion. I do think it sucks that the farmers take the worst hit because it’s not their fault, really, but something had to change and I’m not sure there was a painless or even less painful way to achieve the same change.