2025 saw the population of U.S. farm-raised turkeys decline. But that's not the only thing about turkeys that shrank during the past year. The average live weight of turkeys has also fallen.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's initial estimate of the live weight of the turkeys that were raised during 2025 is 32.0 pounds, which is down from 32.8 points in 2024 and is coincidentally back to what the average farm-raised turkey weighed in 2023.
First, let's see how the live weight of farm-raised turkeys in 2025 compares with the averages recorded in previous years. The following interactive chart shows how the size of live turkeys raised on U.S. farms has changed from 1970 through 2025.
Even at 32 pounds, farm-raised turkeys in 2025 are double the average size of wild "heritage" turkeys in the U.S. Virtually all of the increase in the size of farm-raised turkeys has taken place since 1980. Since 2020, the growth of U.S. farm-raised turkeys has stagnated largely because of two factors.
The first is the inflation unleashed by the Biden administration that sent feed prices soaring, making it much more costly for turkey farmers to raise turkeys. The second is bird influenza, in which the culling of turkey flocks to limit its spread has reduced the available supply, leading turkey producers to process smaller birds for market than they ordinarily would to meet consumer demand.
What that all means is that the growth of the average farm-raised turkey has stagnated since 2021, making the period since like the great stagnation of the 1970s. Coincidentally, that era was also defined by high inflation in the U.S. economy.
References
U.S. Department of Agriculture. Turkeys Raised. [PDF Document]. 26 September 2025.
U.S. Department of Agriculture. World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE). U.S. Quarterly Animal Product Production. Nov Proj. Turkey (Ready To Cook Weight, millions of pounds). [PDF Document]. 14 November 2025.
U.S. Department of Agriculture. Meat statistics tables, recent. Table 3 - Livestock and poultry live and dressed weights. [Excel Spreadsheet]. 30 September 2025.
Image credit: Close-up of a turkey's head and neck photo by Chandler Cruttenden on Unsplash.
Labels: thanksgiving
The population of farm-raised turkeys fell in 2025, continuing a decades-long trend of shrinking.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Agricultural Statistics Service reported an initial population estimate of 194.5 million, which represents the total production of turkeys on U.S. farms for 2025. The NASS also revised its 2024 population estimate downward, from 205 million to 200 million.
The decline in the population of turkeys has been ongoing since the population of farm-raised turkey's in the U.S. peaked at 302.7 million in 1996. 2025's estimated population of 194.5 million farm-raised turkeys was last previously observed between 1985 and 1986, when the production of turkeys surged from 185.4 to 207.2 million because of increased demand for lean protein during the low-fat diet craze of that era.
The Epoch Times describes the rise and fall of turkey in America and what that says about how much turkey Americans are eating:
Turkey consumption in the United States has followed an arc over the past century, driven by agricultural, technological and health trends.
According to the USDA Economic Research Service, the average person in the United States ate less than three pounds of turkey a year in the 1930s and 1940s. By 1960, that number had doubled, as producers introduced specialized bird breeds that yielded more meat.
Advances in production and the introduction of processed products such as luncheon meats, ground turkey, and deli items drove turkey’s popularity in the 1980s. Marketing campaigns promoted the bird as a healthy, low-fat meat.
Annual turkey consumption rose from an average of about 10 pounds per person in 1980, to a peak of 18 pounds per person in 1996.
Since that time, however, consumers have been steadily eating less turkey. In 2025, average turkey consumption is projected to be just over 13 pounds per person, a nearly 40 year low.
In total, the USDA projects 4.5 billion pounds of turkey will be eaten in 2025—the lowest amount since 1990, according to the latest World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report.
The USDA estimates 195 million turkeys were raised in 2025, the lowest number in 40 years. This is the second consecutive annual decline, with production falling about 3 percent from 2024 and around 11 percent from 2023.
The following interactive chart presents the number of farm-raised turkeys for each year from 1970 through 2025:
Americans will eat about 30 million of those 194.5 million farm-raised turkeys during the 2025 Thanksgiving holiday.
On a final note, our interactive chart doesn't account for the population of wild turkeys in the United States. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service indicates that portion of the total population of turkeys in the U.S. was around 6.5 million in 2024. Without anything to suggest any major changes in the wild population has occurred, we assume this estimate is still valid. Including the wild population of turkeys with farm-raised turkeys brings the total estimated population of the bird up to 201 million for 2025.
References
U.S. Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Statistics Service. Livestock Historic Data. [Online Database: Survey - Animals & Products - Poultry - Turkeys - Production - Turkeys Production Measured in Head - Total - National - US Total - 1929-2025 - Annual - Year]. Accessed 23 November 2025.
Image credit: A group of turkeys in a fenced area photo by Heather Gill on Unsplash.
Labels: thanksgiving
The S&P 500 (Index: SPX) experienced a lot of intraday volatility in the trading week ending on Friday, 21 November 2025. By the close of the week's trading, the index was down 1.95% from its previous week's close.
Two factors combined to put the market through big swings during the week that was. The AI tech stocks that have helped power the S&P 500 to record highs during 2025 got a big boost from Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) after the close of trading on Wednesday, 19 November 2025, when the company announced its cloud GPU products sold out, affirming the megacap's outlook going into 2026.
The market's positive reaction to that news was tempered on Thursday however, as a number of Federal Reserve officials staked out positions against continuing the Fed's recent rate cuts in December 2025. That information sent stock prices down to their lowest level since 10 September 2025, which was partially reversed on Friday when the Fed's second-highest ranking official signaled a rate cut "in the near term" would be likely.
The response by investors to the prospect a "near term" rate cut is remarkable. The CME Group's FedWatch Tool rose to indicate a 71% probability of a quarter point rate cut on 10 December (2025-Q4), up from just 44% a week ago, with virtually all of that change taking place on Friday, 21 November 2025. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 rose nearly one percent on the day to end the trading week at 6,602.99.
Looking further forward, the FedWatch tool gives better than even odds for additional quarter point rate cuts in 2026, coming on 29 April (2026-Q2), 29 July (2026-Q3), and 9 December (2026-Q4). The potential timing of all these projected rate cuts remains very fluid with substantial changes in expectations from week to week.
For the latest update of the alternative futures chart, we've added a new short-term redzone forecast range to compensate for the echo of historic volatility in stock prices in the dividend futures-based model. The echo effect arises as a result of the model's use of historic stock prices as the base reference points from which its projections of future stock prices are determined. The new redzone forecast range assumes investors will remain focused on the current quarter of 2025-Q4 in setting stock prices during the period it runs.
Speaking of the echo effect, the chart also shows we'll have another, longer period coming up in which the model's projections will be similarly affected, though for that period, we anticipate the model's projections will undershoot the trajectory of stock prices.
We also likely won't know how investors will reset their forward-looking investment time horizon after the Fed's 10 December 2025 meeting. They will shift their attention to a more distant quarter in the future, but the open question that remains to be answered is which one?
Sorting that out depends on the context of the random onset of new information investors will absorb in the weeks ahead. Until those make themselves known, here are the past week's market moving headlines.
- Monday, 17 November 2025
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- Signs and portents for the U.S. economy:
- Oil prices ease after loadings resume at Russian export hub
- US construction spending rebounds in August
- China deal buys US time to build critical minerals supply chain
- Fed minions keep sending mixed messages on December 2025 rate cut probability:
- Fed needs to move slowly with further rate cuts, Jefferson says
- Fed's Waller says weak job market justifies rate cut in December
- Bigger trouble developing in Japan, BOJ minions get multiple reasons to hold off on rate hike plans:
- Japan's economy contracts for first time in six quarters on tariff hit
- Japan government panel member Kataoka calls for $149 billion stimulus package
- Threats Of Sanctions, Economic Warfare, As Japan-China Relations Sink To Decades Low
- ECB minions say Eurozone: monetary policy is appropriate:
- Wall Street extends losses as investors await Nvidia results, other Q3 earnings
- Tuesday, 18 November 2025
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- Signs and portents for the U.S. economy:
- Oil rises on Russia sanctions, interviews for next US Fed chair
- US factory orders rebound as expected in August
- Exclusive: China snaps up US soybeans after pledge to Trump, but at high price, traders say
- Fed minions say they want more economic data from the government:
- BOJ minions looking to get "smooth landing" for Japan's inflation, Japan's new PM looking to get monetary policy support from BOJ minions:
- BOJ chief tells Takaichi central bank seeking smooth landing towards price goal
- Japan PM Takaichi to meet BOJ Governor Ueda on Tuesday, PM office says
- Bigger trouble developing in Japan:
- Japan finance minister says 'alarmed' over yen's volatility
- China threatens more countermeasures over Japan PM's Taiwan remarks
- ECB minions suddenly really worried about Eurozone banks going under:
- Wall Street finished the day firmly lower despite afternoon efforts to pare higher
- Wednesday, 19 November 2025
-
- Signs and portents for the U.S. economy:
- US trade deficit narrows sharply in August in boost to third-quarter GDP
- Oil falls on signs of renewed push to end Russia-Ukraine war
- Beijing Jumps Back Into US Soybean Market, Snaps Up 20 Cargo Loads After Abrupt Pause
- Fed minions less likely to cut rates in December because shutdown blocked government from collecting jobs data in October, Fed minutes reveal Fed minions all over the map for rate cuts, one minions proposes Fed balance sheet relief:
- December Fed rate cut odds slide after cancellation of October jobs report
- Fed cut rates even as many of its policymakers worried about inflation, minutes show
- Fed minutes show support for ending quantitative tightening
- What Fed cut? US repo rates still high as liquidity tightens into year-end
- Fed's Miran calls for exempting Treasuries from bank leverage rule
- Trump looking to replace Fed Chair Powell:
- BOJ minions really starting to get worried as much bigger trouble develops in Japan:
- Japan policymakers agree to watch market with 'strong sense of urgency', yen weakens
- Japan Bond Yields Soar To Record, Slamming Door On Stimulus Just As Economy Implodes Amid Escalating China Clash
- ECB minions thinking about going on vacation all next year:
- Wall Street finished higher despite a volatile topsy turvy trading session
- Thursday, 20 November 2025
-
- Signs and portents for the U.S. economy:
- US posts solid job gains in September but unemployment rate rises to 4.4%
- US existing home sales increase in October
- Oil edges higher on inventory draw and equities rally
- Trump signs order to remove tariffs from Brazilian beef, coffee
- Fed minions divided on more rate cuts:
- Fed's Hammack warns more rate cuts court financial stability risks
- Fed's Paulson is 'cautiously' approaching December rate decision, she says
- Fed's Goolsbee uneasy about rate cuts, says nothing wrong with dissenting
- Bigger trouble, stimulus developing in China:
- China steel output slumps as iron ore imports head for record
- China expected to keep rates steady for sixth month as PBOC turns less dovish
- BOJ minions plans to hike rates again in question:
- BOJ set to hike interest rates in December, but decision on knife-edge
- Japan policymakers agree to watch market with 'strong sense of urgency', yen weakens
- ECB minions wants to see outlook get really bad to justify next Eurozone rate cut:
- Nasdaq slides more than 2%, marking a stunning reversal from gains of more than 2%
- Friday, 21 November 2025
-
- Signs and portents for the U.S. economy:
- U.S. job growth in 2025 weakest in 15 years, excluding pandemic's 2020
- US manufacturing slows in November as high prices curb demand
- Oil prices settle down at lowest in a month as US seeks Russia-Ukraine peace deal
- China's largest US soybean buy in 2 years buoys prices, triggers sales by struggling farmers
- High ranking Fed minion signals rate cut "in the near term" while others take every position imaginable, one minion says AI not like Dot-Com bubble:
- December rate cut odds swing back up sharply after NY Fed's Williams sees room for easing
- Fed's Collins leans against December rate cut in CNBC interview
- Fed's Logan calls for holding rates steady 'for a time'
- Fed's Miran would back 25-bp rate cut if he were 'marginal vote' - BBG TV
- Fed's Jefferson: AI-related stock gains unlikely to be dot-com boom replay
- Bigger stimulus developing in China:
- Inflation data pushes BOJ minions closer to hiking Japan's interest rates as they also worry about yen possibly collapsing:
- Japan's core inflation accelerates in October, stays above BOJ target
- BOJ nearing decision to raise rates, board member Masu says -Nikkei
- Japan ramps up warning of yen intervention, chance of near-term rate hike
- Wall Street ended notably higher following the previous session’s violent swings
The Atlanta Fed's GDPNow tool projection of real GDP growth in the U.S. during the recently ended 2025-Q3 increased from +4.0% to +4.2% as several delayed economic data reports started to come in following the end of the Senate Democrats' shutdown. The BEA's official estimates of GDP for 2025-Q3 will likely be delayed into December 2025 given the upcoming holiday calendar.
With the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, we're anticipating a low volume of news coming out of the U.S. in the week ahead. That means much of the market-moving news will be coming from outside the U.S., where we anticipate paying a lot of attention to developments in both China and especially Japan.
Image credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "An editorial cartoon of Federal Reserve officials dressed as professional wrestlers who are fighting about whether to cut interest rates or not".
It can be very difficult to find a good gift to give the people closest to you. That challenge can become even more difficult if they're the kind of people who really like math. What can you give to them that will excite them and, perhaps most importantly for the most enthusiastic among them, they haven't already gotten for themselves? Or that you haven't gotten them before?
Speaking of which, let's recap the very short list of gift ideas we've previously suggested, in case you've already exhausted those options:
- What to Get a Maths Enthusiast for Christmas (Klein bottle)
- Oddly shaped objects that roll smoothly (oloids)
- Games Mathematicians Play (21X)
This year, we'll suggest three new options, including two that offer the bonus of being potentially practical. Starting with....
The "Sometimes I Go Off on a Tangent" Coffee Mug
Coffee mugs are inherently practical, and frankly, much easier to drink from than a Klein bottle. This one features a design than illustrates the mathematical concept of tangents, pairing it with a really bad math pun.
Despite the bad mathematical pun, this 11-ounce ceramic mug is microwave and "dishwasher safe", though handwashing is recommended. Otherwise, it's a fully practical mug.
Many Amazon reviewers mention buying this mug as a gift for their math teachers. However, if you really knew any math teachers, you would know that 11-ounces of a caffeine-laden beverage isn't going to cut it for them. Instead, this is a mug in which they can keep their fancy Hagoromo colored chalk on their classroom desk. Right next to the much larger mug from which they will consume their preferred caffeinated beverages.
"The Proof Is in the Pudding" Bowls
These are actual pudding bowls which were created and marketed by "The Unemployed Philosophers Guild", who love both bad puns and mathematical proofs. Here's an excerpt of their product description:
- A set of four ceramic pudding bowls with the proofs to classic theorems of Euclid, Hippasus, Pythagoras, and Gauss. Terrific gift for mathematicians, scientists, students, or any geek on your gift list.
- We are not going to lie to you: this one is for the mathematikoi-the inner circle of the school of Pythagoras. If you think all math is rational, you are living in a fool's paradise.
- These bowls are dangerous-so dangerous that one theorem just might have culminated in murder. (Look it up-Hippasus of Metapontum sleeps with the fishes because he couldn't keep his mouth shut about the square root of 2).
They're not kidding when they say these bowls are for the "mathematikoi", which we think of as those people who like math so much they unironically get tattoos of their favorite formulas. If you know that person, you now know what to get them as a gift.
Infinite Powers: How Calculus Reveals the Secrets of the Universe
This is a good introductory book on the topic of calculus, why and how it was invented, and what people use it for. That said, the best and most engaging parts of the book are the ones where author Steven Strogatz breaks away from the math and has fun with the topic at hand. Here's an example:
All across the world, students are being taught that division by zero is forbidden. They should feel shocked that such a taboo exists. Numbers are supposed to be orderly and well behaved. Math class is a place for logic and reasoning. And yet it's possible to ask simple things of numbers that just don't work or make sense. Dividing by zero is one of them.
The root of the problem is infinity. Dividing by zero summons infinity in much the same way that a Ouija board supposedly summons spirits from another realm. It's risky. Don't go there.
Strogatz is also the host of Quanta Magazine's "The Joy of Why" podcast, the title of which is a riff on his earlier book "The Joy of X: A Guided Tour of Math, from One to Infinity. Infinite Powers is very rare math book that falls in between the binary extremes of "too simple" and "too advanced" levels of knowledge needed to enjoy reading them. As such, this book represents a better-than-average gift idea for the majority of maths enthusiasts you may know.
With these gift ideas in hand for perhaps the most difficult person for whom you need to give a present, you can now move on to shop for more normal people!
Image credit: Hands exchanging a gift with a red ribbon photo by Vitaly Gariev on Unsplash.
After a strong rebound in July, the combined value of goods traded between the U.S. and China dipped in August 2025. The release of trade data for this month was delayed until 19 November 2025 because of the record 43-day shutdown of nonessential U.S. government functions that ended last week.
Exports from the U.S. to China totaled $8.272 billion, which were down 11% from July's level and down nearly 37% year-over-year. Imported goods shipped from China to the U.S. totaled $25.133 billion, which were down nearly 5% month-over-month and about 31% since August 2024.
The combined value of trade between the U.S. and China for August 2025 is $33.1 billion, a 6.5% decrease from July's showing.
The trailing twelve month average of the combined total of goods exchanged between the U.S. and China continued falling in August. It now falls 15.3% below a counterfactual projection of how the value of trade between the two nations would have grown in the absence of the global tariff war. The following chart presents the monthly data for the combined value of goods exchanged between the U.S. and China. It also presents the trailing twelve month average, which smooths out much of the year-to-year seasonal variation in the trade data in the period from January 2017 through August 2025.
On 1 November 2025, the U.S. and China struck a new truce in their tariff war that lowered tariffs considerably more than their 28 June deal, though we won't see its effect in the data until November 2025's data becomes available early in 2026. In the meantime, we anticipate we'll continue tracking an overall downward trend in trade between the U.S. and China until the trade between the two countries following the deal starts to gain traction.
References
U.S. Census Bureau. U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services (FT900). U.S. Trade in Goods with China, Not Seasonally Adjusted, Nominal Figures, Total Census Basis. [Online database]. Accessed 19 November 2025.
Image credit: Empty Storage Container photo by Moj Box on Unsplash.
Labels: trade
Welcome to the blogosphere's toolchest! Here, unlike other blogs dedicated to analyzing current events, we create easy-to-use, simple tools to do the math related to them so you can get in on the action too! If you would like to learn more about these tools, or if you would like to contribute ideas to develop for this blog, please e-mail us at:
ironman at politicalcalculations
Thanks in advance!
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