Justin Fox, Columnist

It's Tough Being a Dairy Farmer Right Now

Blame almond milk -- but thank cheese lovers for keeping things afloat.

April 28, 2017 at 2:28 PM UTC

Justin Fox is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering business, economics and other topics involving charts. A former editorial director of the Harvard Business Review, he is author of “The Myth of the Rational Market.”

Don't look at me.
Photographer: Scott Olson/Getty Images

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America's dairy farmers have been having a tough couple of years. There's a glut of milk on the market, and prices are low.

Wisconsin's dairypeople seem especially put out. They've persuaded one of their U.S. senators, Democrat Tammy Baldwin, to introduce legislation that "would require non-dairy products made from nuts, seeds, plants, and algae to no longer be mislabeled with dairy terms such as milk, yogurt or cheese." And now a small group that lost its Canadian buyers for a specialized product (ultra-filtered milk used in making cheese and yogurt) have gotten President Donald Trump to launch a trade skirmish on their behalf.