They’ve Got Beef: Meatpacking Workers Strike
About 3,800 employees at the JBS-owned factory in Greeley, CO—one of the largest slaughterhouses in the US—yesterday initiated the first walkout from a meat-processing plant in four decades.
The union claims wages are behind the pace of inflation and the company has created an unsafe working environment, which JBS refutes.
The strike comes with the cost of beef soaring and JBS reporting $566 million in losses through the first nine months of 2025. The US cattle population is at a 75-year low, and that scarcity has led cattle ranchers to increase their prices, putting a strain on the bottom line for the meatpacking industry.
Where’s the beef? The last time there was a strike at a US slaughterhouse was at a Hormel plant in Minnesota in 1985, according to the Greeley workers’ union leader, Kim Cordova. That work stoppage lasted a year.
Going south: High prices are also affecting consumers—the average cost for a pound of 100% ground beef in February was $6.74, about a penny shy of an all-time high set in January, per the Bureau of Labor Statistics. To help offset the cost of cheesesteaks and burgers, President Trump signed an executive order last month to quadruple beef imports from Argentina. US cattle ranchers argued the move will damage livelihoods while doing little to bring down beef prices.—DL
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