To prevent the spread of bird flu, 166 million birds were culled, most toward the end of 2024. Since the US typically has about 400 million egg-laying hens at any time, this was significant. With fewer hens, the supply of eggs also fell causing egg prices to more than double. Thankfully, this market disruption already appears to be behind us. A recent USDA report shows that production and egg prices have mostly recovered to where they were a year ago.
Damn that's fast. And just in time for Easter egg hunts. Not even the Ag sector expected the recovery of the egg industry so quickly. Just last month, Farm Progress forecasted, "The U.S. poultry industry could take a year or so to recover from the recent HPAI outbreak." They were only off by 11 months.
The speed of this adjustment is a testament to market forces. With prices doubled, egg producers saw a huge opportunity for short-run profits. Hens that might have been "retired" a year ago would be kept in service a bit longer. Chicks that might otherwise have been deemed unacceptable would be allowed to mature. Had the policy response instead been to impose egg price ceilings to prevent price gouging, the blunted profit motive would have weakened the supply response. Allowing the market to operate alleviated the shortage in short order.
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