As Americans struggle to pay for high-priced eggs in grocery stores, the widespread shortage has spurred a national conversation over the cause of the common pantry staple's soaring cost.
Egg prices in December were nearly 60% higher from one year ago, according to a recent Consumer Price Index report. Nearly 58 million birds have been affected by the Avian flu virus, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
After some conservatives blamed President Biden and socialism for the shortage, several liberals took to Twitter to mock their beliefs, and blame capitalism instead.
EGG PRICES FORCING RESTAURANTS TO RAISE PRICES FOR CUSTOMERS
USA Today opinion columnist Michael J. Stern claimed "classic capitalism" was responsible for high egg prices.
"#1 - 50,000,000 chickens have died in the U.S. due to Avian flu. #2 - Supply and demand made egg prices increase. #3 - That's classic capitalism, which y'all love...until you pay $5 for a dozen eggs. Then you want the government to do something about it. That's socialism," he taunted.
Democrat activist and former Ohio state Sen. Nina Turner also scoffed at people blaming socialism for the egg shortage and said it was really a result of our "hyper-capitalist country."
"Blaming the egg shortage and price-hike on ‘socialism’ is ignoring the fact that it’s happening in a hyper-capitalist country," she tweeted.
Musical group Eve 6 slammed those pinning socialism for the slew of problems with the FAA, food supply and health care.
"It’s just funny that as the quality of everything from airlines to infrastructure to food safety and availability to healthcare continues to precipitously erode around us millions of people blame socialism, an economic system that we do not live under," they mocked.
TWITTER USERS DECLARE EGGS A ‘LUXURY ITEM’ AS PRICES SOAR: ‘THE NEW BITCOIN’
Senator Bernie Sanders, I-VT, also blamed "corporate greed" to push for a windfall profit tax.
"Corporate greed is the producer of Egg-Land's Best, Farmhouse Eggs & Land O'Lake Eggs, increasing its profits by 65% last quarter to a record-breaking $198 million while doubling the price of eggs & reporting no positive cases of avian flu. Yes. We need a windfall profits tax," he tweeted.
The podcast host of Punch Up Pod blamed high egg prices on "evil" capitalism.
"Imagine having to work 2 hours to buy eggs," the account tweeted. "Capitalism is evil," the account added with a picture of organic eggs selling for over $11.00.
Eggs are not the only normally widely-available consumer product that's off the shelves or extremely high-priced. Over the last year, families have struggled to find baby formula and pain medicine due to shortages of both products.
