Protein prices have climbed sharply in recent years, driven by a collision of factors: a shrinking national cattle herd, a devastating avian flu outbreak, higher feed costs for livestock producers, and drought conditions that forced ranchers to sell off animals they couldn’t afford to maintain. The result is a grocery bill that feels noticeably heavier in the meat, dairy, and egg aisles. In 2024 alone, prices for meats, poultry, fish, and eggs rose 4.2 percent overall, with egg prices spiking 36.8 percent.
Avian Flu Wiped Out Millions of Hens
The single biggest factor behind skyrocketing egg prices is H5N1 avian influenza. Between 2022 and 2024, the United States lost more than 60 million egg-laying hens to the disease itself and to the government’s standard depopulation program, which requires destroying entire flocks once the virus is detected. California alone lost around 10.6 million laying hens plus another million young hens that were about to start producing.
Those losses hit the market hard. National wholesale egg prices cleared $5 per dozen, and California egg prices rose above $7 per dozen. Replacing a flock isn’t quick. It takes months to hatch, raise, and bring new hens into production, which means supply shortages linger well after the outbreaks themselves are contained. Egg prices had actually fallen 23.8 percent in 2023 as flocks recovered from earlier waves, only to surge again at the end of 2024 when new outbreaks struck.
The U.S. Cattle Herd Keeps Shrinking
Beef prices reflect a problem that’s been building for over a decade. The national beef herd, roughly 25 million head, shrank about 1 to 2 percent per year during a sustained drought between 2011 and 2015. Ranchers who couldn’t afford to buy hay and feed simply sold animals, and rebuilding a cattle herd is a slow process. A cow takes about two years to produce a calf that’s ready for the feedlot, so every year of liquidation creates years of reduced supply downstream.
That contraction is still playing out. As of January 2026, USDA data shows 11.5 million cattle on feed in large feedlots, down 3 percent from the year before. Both steers and heifers declined by the same margin. Fewer animals entering the supply chain means less beef at the grocery store, and that scarcity keeps prices elevated even when consumer demand softens.
Feed Costs Have Roughly Doubled
The animals that do make it to market cost significantly more to raise than they did 20 years ago. Corn and soybean meal are the two primary ingredients in livestock feed, and both underwent a dramatic price shift in the late 2000s that never fully reversed. From 2000 to 2006, corn averaged $2.18 per bushel. From 2007 onward, that average jumped to $4.83. Soybean meal went from $187 per ton to $362 over the same periods.
Those increases ripple directly into the price of pork, chicken, and beef. In hog production, for example, every 10-cent increase in the price of corn adds about 47 cents per hundred pounds of finishing cost. Every $10 increase in soybean meal adds another 33 cents. The difference between a good year and a bad year for grain prices can swing a hog farmer’s feed bill by more than $7 per hundred pounds of animal produced. Poultry and cattle operations face similar math, and those costs get passed along at the register.
Drought Forces Ranchers to Liquidate
Livestock producers who rely on rainfall to grow the grass and hay their animals eat are especially vulnerable to drought. When pastures dry up, ranchers face a brutal choice: buy expensive supplemental feed or sell animals at whatever price the market offers. During severe drought, most choose to sell, which temporarily floods the market with cheap beef but sets up a supply shortage in the years that follow.
This cycle has repeated several times in the past 15 years across the Southern Plains, the West, and parts of the Midwest. Each round of liquidation makes the national herd smaller and recovery slower. The federal government’s Livestock Forage Disaster Program helps offset some costs, but the USDA’s Economic Research Service has noted that drought threats are expected to continue increasing, which means the financial pressure on ranchers isn’t easing.
Meatpacking Concentration Plays a Role
Between the rancher and your grocery cart sits the meatpacking industry, which is highly concentrated. A small number of large companies process the majority of U.S. beef, and USDA researchers have studied how this concentration affects the “spread,” the gap between what packers pay ranchers for cattle and what consumers pay for retail beef. That spread encompasses processing costs and profits.
Wages in meatpacking plants have risen faster than overall inflation in recent years, though USDA analysis found that only a small portion of the growing spread can be attributed to rising plant costs. When plants run at or above capacity, labor expenses climb further because overtime shifts become necessary. The rest of the spread reflects the pricing power that comes with limited competition, a structural factor that keeps retail prices higher than production costs alone would suggest.
Plant-Based Alternatives Aren’t Cheaper
If you’ve looked at plant-based burgers and sausages as an alternative, you’ve probably noticed they don’t offer much relief. Across six European countries studied in a recent analysis published in Food Research International, meat substitutes were 24 to 115 percent more expensive than conventional meat (Germany was the sole exception, where prices had reached parity). U.S. pricing follows a similar pattern. A package of plant-based ground “beef” typically costs more per pound than actual ground beef, which makes it a lifestyle choice rather than a budget one for most shoppers.
Affordable Protein Sources That Still Exist
The good news is that not all protein has gotten expensive at the same rate. Several options remain reliably cheap and nutritionally solid.
- Beans and lentils: A one-pound bag of black beans costs around $1.50 and contains about 13 servings. Lentils, chickpeas, and split peas offer similar value, plus fiber and minerals that meat doesn’t provide.
- Canned fish: A can of tuna often costs less than a bag of beans and delivers complete protein with healthy fats. Canned sardines and salmon are similarly affordable.
- Low-fat dairy: Milk, cottage cheese, and yogurt contain all nine essential amino acids and tend to be significantly cheaper per gram of protein than beef or chicken breast.
- Whole grains: Oats, brown rice, and whole wheat pasta aren’t protein powerhouses on their own, but they contribute meaningful amounts when paired with beans or dairy, and they’re among the cheapest items in the store.
- Nuts, seeds, and peanut butter: Higher in calories due to their fat content, but calorie-for-calorie they deliver good protein along with heart-healthy fats.
Combining a few of these, like rice and beans or oatmeal with peanut butter, gives you a complete amino acid profile at a fraction of what you’d spend on a steak. For most people, the protein price crunch is really a meat and egg price crunch, and the grocery store still has plenty of workarounds if you’re willing to shift what’s on your plate.