Farm Action and Farm Action Fund are leading organizations in exposing and reining in the corporate control of our food system that harms farmers, workers, and all of us who eat. We use our expertise to boldly call out corporations’ undue influence on agriculture policy, hold corporations and the government accountable, and enact meaningful solutions that advance a fairer, more sustainable, and healthy food system.
There’s no better example to demonstrate how we work than our successful campaign addressing the corporate egg pricing scheme that began in 2022. Our research blew the lid off egg corporations’ false excuses for hiking egg prices and exposed their unchecked profiteering. Following our letters to federal antitrust enforcers in January 2023 and again in February 2025, we successfully changed the narrative in the media and public discourse and rallied support for government action. Two years later, our work has resulted in a federal investigation into egg pricing, proposed legislation to prevent these corporations from taking even more taxpayer money through government bailouts, and, importantly, lower egg prices for American families.
Here’s how we work:
Monitor the Market
Using our team’s research, agricultural, and economic expertise, we monitor food and agriculture markets, looking for sectors that are not responding as they should in our country’s economic model. When spotting such activity, we look for potential abuses in the market and identify instances where corporations wield their outsized control to exploit consumers. By carefully examining industry data and reports, media coverage, and corporate financial statements, our team is quick to spot suspicious behavior.
Over the last few years, we’ve often seen corporations blame “supply chain disruptions” and inflation as an excuse to excessively increase their prices on farmers and consumers. Our team noted that dominant egg companies were quick to blame avian flu and inflation as they hiked egg prices.
That’s how Farm Action first identified that egg corporations appeared to be price-gouging consumers. When egg prices more than doubled at grocery stores beginning in late 2022, our team took a closer look at egg suppliers’ financial statements and publicly available industry data to understand what was really driving the price hikes.
We looked closely at the numbers in early 2023 and saw that the math didn’t add up: According to their own financial statements, Cal-Maine, which controls 20% of the egg market, increased its gross profit margins fivefold after drastically raising the price of its eggs. Meanwhile, the company had not reported any cases of avian flu, and their production costs had gone up only marginally. We compiled our findings in our initial letter to antitrust enforcers calling for an investigation into the industry.
Call Out Abuses
Once we clearly identify a problem, we’re not afraid to stand up to corporations and call out their abuses. We fight to change the narrative, pushing back against corporate greed and raising awareness among the public, the press, and policymakers.
Our work exposing the egg pricing scheme received media coverage from thousands of news outlets—including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Associated Press, Bloomberg, ABC, CNBC, The Guardian, CNN, Today Show, and more—as well as a profile in the Washington Post.
Farm Action’s letter calling for an investigation into potential price gouging was featured on the Today Show.
Going further to call out this abuse, Farm Action’s Joe Maxwell also testified during a Senate Committee hearing on price gouging, highlighting Farm Action’s work investigating price gouging across the food system, including in the egg sector.
Importantly, we always keep the farmers’ perspective first in our work and ensure we expose injustices they face. We revealed that while Cal-Maine was raking in egregious profits from hiking egg prices since 2022, the farmers they contract with had been trapped in predatory contracts, receiving just 26 cents per dozen eggs. Offering this perspective to the public and media helps to hold abusive corporations accountable for how they treat the farmers they work or contract with.
Find Solutions and Urge Action
We don’t stop at shining a light on abuses in the market—we carefully craft and propose solutions to improve competition in the marketplace and level the playing field for consumers and farmers. A key element of our strategy is urging the government to hold these corporations accountable, whether it’s calling for investigations or urging passage of critical legislation through Farm Action Fund.
In order to crack down on corporate egg price gouging, Farm Action wrote letters urging federal investigations in January 2023 and again in February 2025. We also rallied thousands of supporters to sign our citizen petition calling for a federal investigation, demonstrating broad and strong support for our letters.
Shortly after our 2025 letter, the Department of Justice (DOJ) opened an antitrust investigation into the egg industry. While Farm Action’s analysis demonstrated likely antitrust abuses by the dominant egg-producing corporations, the DOJ has the legal authority to access the inner workings of the industry that is required to get to the bottom of this abuse. And it’s no coincidence that egg prices plummeted after the DOJ opened its investigation.
Source: USDA Weekly Combined Regional Shell Egg Report. Data from the Biden Administration available here. Credit: The Sling
We’re also continuing to hold the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) accountable after the agency’s own data showed the corporate egg production model is making avian flu worse—yet USDA announced its plan to bail out the largest corporations driving the virus spread, using taxpayer dollars. After raising awareness about this, Farm Action worked with Senator Jack Reed on legislation to prevent these corporations from taking even more taxpayer money through government bailouts.
Our work on the corporate egg pricing scheme is just one example of how Farm Action and Farm Action Fund advance a food and farm system that works for everyone, not just a handful of corporations, and highlights the most critical component of our work: our ingrained principle to never give up.
