Temporarily lower prices. A large consumer base is needed to support the infrastructure that provides meat food products. More people eating more meat will normally produce lower prices in the long-term.
Marginal cost doesn’t always decrease. More people buying gold or whatever won’t decrease the price of gold. The cheapest way to feed cattle is to just let them graze, but there isn’t enough land on Earth for everyone to eat as much beef as Americans, even if using intensive agriculture to grow feed (which degrades the soil over time and results in large amounts of greenhouse gas emissions). I don’t think there’s enough land on Earth to maintain the current human population for very long. I.e. I think we are in the overshoot phase of a boom and bust population dynamic. Saw this graphic a while back, and it’s wild how much of the biomass we’ve took over:
It may be made up for in quality though, having a smaller consumer base may result in ensuring higher quality meat on average. Perhaps even a situation where lab grown meat is used for things like hamburgers or chicken nuggets.
Temporarily lower prices. A large consumer base is needed to support the infrastructure that provides meat food products. More people eating more meat will normally produce lower prices in the long-term.
Marginal cost doesn’t always decrease. More people buying gold or whatever won’t decrease the price of gold. The cheapest way to feed cattle is to just let them graze, but there isn’t enough land on Earth for everyone to eat as much beef as Americans, even if using intensive agriculture to grow feed (which degrades the soil over time and results in large amounts of greenhouse gas emissions). I don’t think there’s enough land on Earth to maintain the current human population for very long. I.e. I think we are in the overshoot phase of a boom and bust population dynamic. Saw this graphic a while back, and it’s wild how much of the biomass we’ve took over:
It may be made up for in quality though, having a smaller consumer base may result in ensuring higher quality meat on average. Perhaps even a situation where lab grown meat is used for things like hamburgers or chicken nuggets.