I think the first piece is that we have to believe that we have a competitive process in place for bidding live cattle; in other words, that there are enough competitors within North America who will bid on live cattle in expectation of making a profit and that the competition will be keen. If all packers have extra opportunity, then they're all able to go out and bid higher for those cattle, if there's sufficient competition. Also, given that premise, I think if there's sufficient competition—and that market power shifts depending on the supply and availability of live cattle—where supplies are not burdensome relative to packer capacity and demand for that week, one could argue that certainly a majority of the value will go back to the producers.
On May 26th, 2010. See this statement in context.