The price of kindness, and the link

Economics

Who pays for kindness?

economics

More space, more bedding and slower growth cost money, so higher welfare usually means higher costs per egg or pound of meat. Someone pays: the farmer, the shopper or the taxpayer. Economists also talk about externalities, costs that fall on someone outside the sale. Whether an animal's suffering is a cost the market should count is a question of values, not just math.

Find the price of a dozen conventional eggs and a dozen pasture-raised eggs at one store. What explains the gap?

Sources: USDA ERS, cage-free share of the flock; newSchoolWorks.com: What is money?

Photo: Tisha Mukherjee, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Economics

Reading the label

economicstrade & commercialization

Labels are signals to buyers. 'Cage-free' means hens are not in cages but may never go outside. 'Free-range' means the birds had access to the outdoors. 'Pasture-raised' has no single federal definition; private certifiers set their own rules. 'Natural' on meat means minimally processed with no artificial ingredients, and says nothing about how the animal lived.

A label is only as good as whoever checks it. Which labels on your kitchen shelf are checked by a third party?

Sources: USDA FSIS, Meat and poultry labeling terms

Photo: Krzysztof Golik, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Economics

What we say and what we buy

economics

In surveys, many people say they would pay more for higher-welfare food, yet at the checkout most buy the cheapest. Economists call this the gap between stated preferences (what we say) and revealed preferences (what we do). Some voters choose to settle the question by law, as in Proposition 12, so that no one company is undercut for doing more.

Is voting for a rule you would not pay for on your own a contradiction, or a solution?

Sources: California Proposition 12 (2018)

Photo: Ivar Leidus, CC BY-SA 3.0 ee via Wikimedia Commons

2022 to 2025

The egg-price shock

economicsbiology

From 2022 a deadly bird flu swept U.S. poultry farms, and tens of millions of laying hens died or were culled to stop it. With fewer hens, the average price of a dozen eggs hit a record high in early 2025 by the Bureau of Labor Statistics count, then fell back. Some blamed cage-free laws; most economists pointed to the sudden loss of supply.

Plot the BLS egg price yourself. Mark when the outbreaks hit. What does the line tell you?

Sources: BLS, Average price of eggs, grade A large, per dozen

Photo: Edward Betts, Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

Sociology and criminology

The Link

history

Researchers have long studied 'the link' between cruelty to animals and violence toward people. In many homes with domestic violence, abusers threaten or harm the family pet, and some victims delay leaving for fear of what will happen to it. In 2016 the FBI began counting animal cruelty as its own crime in national data, in categories such as neglect, intentional abuse and organized abuse like fighting. A 2018 federal law funds shelters that take in survivors' pets.

A link is a pattern in data, not a rule about every person. What else would you need to know?

Sources: American University, Exploring the link between animal cruelty and family violence; PAWS Act, H.R. 909, 115th Congress (Congress.gov)

Photo: Felinlove, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

1963 to today

A warning sign, not a prophecy

history

In 1963 a psychiatrist proposed that three childhood behaviors, bed-wetting, fire-setting and cruelty to animals, together predicted later violence. Later studies found little support for that 'triad'. Researchers today treat a child's cruelty to animals as a serious warning sign that calls for help and attention, not as proof of what the child will become.

Why is it dangerous to treat a pattern in groups as a prediction about one person?

Sources: Macdonald triad

Photo: Acroterion, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Sociology

What counts as cruel changes

history

Bear-baiting drew crowds in London for centuries until it was banned in 1835; cockfighting stayed legal in Louisiana until 2008. Sociologists study how a society decides what is deviant. Howard Becker called the people who campaign to make a new rule 'moral entrepreneurs'. Animal-welfare reformers, from Martin to today's activists, fit that role, and so do the groups who push back.

Read the deviance section of the penology gallery, then name one practice with animals that might be judged cruel in fifty years.

Sources: Urbanicity Research, Penology: punishment and deviance; Cruel Treatment of Cattle Act 1822

Photo: Tail furry, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Sociology

A movement and its counter-movement

historyeconomics

The animal movement shows how social movements work: groups gather money and members, frame the issue ('cruelty' against 'tradition' or 'livelihood'), win ballot votes and laws, and meet counter-movements that answer with lawsuits, ads and laws of their own, such as ag-gag bills. Each side's framing is a tool. Spotting it is a skill.

Pick one card in this museum and rewrite its headline twice: once in each side's frame.

Sources: Ag-gag

Photo: Prosthetic Head, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Who pays for kindness?

Reading the label

What we say and what we buy

The egg-price shock

The Link

A warning sign, not a prophecy

What counts as cruel changes

A movement and its counter-movement

Room quiz