[throwup238]

Most of the feed that cattle get on feedlots is waste from ethanol and biofuel production, aka distillers grains. We feed cattle very little fresh grain so all of the statistics about cropland use are extremely misleading. Several industries use that grain one after the other.

That feed along with the fresh hay is fed to cows at the end of their life to fatten them up for human consumption. Notice how the article you linked says 200 million acres of cropland used for beef and 325 million overall versus 900 million acres of total farmland? Most of the difference is marginal pasture that can’t grow anything for human consumption. We don’t fertilize or water it, it’s just grassland that grow by itself where we raise cows before sending them to feedlots. Without that cropland going to distillers and cows, over 60% of our farmland would be completely useless. Not only that but most of our cropland isn’t very useful either - 95% of the corn we grow is inedible dent corn. It’s one of the cheapest commodities on the planet that’s only worth growing as a last resort.

We make this tradeoff because those 600 million acres of otherwise unusable farmland are far more resilient than our cropland so we have a huge backup of calories incase of massive crop failure.

[xarope]

That's a good point, I know in Australia, NZ, the Uk/Wales etc, sheep and cattle graze in farmland that would not be easy to reshape (e.g. terraced) for agriculture. So that otherwise "useless" farmland ends up being useful.

Source: rock climbing one day and finding sheep grazing on plush grass in an otherwise inaccessible location. Apparently it's well known, and locals will climb up to look for said lost sheep.

[joshuahaglund]

Their feed and hay occupy land and use water that could be used more efficiently to directly feed humans.

My uncle was a cattle rancher in Arizona, on "marginal" land that didn't grow food for humans. It didn't grow enough for his cows either. We would leave out bales of alfalfa to keep the cows healthy. Alfalfa is grown in those big irrigated circles you've surely seen while flying.

Most beef consumed in the US comes from feedlots. Over 70% of "grass-fed" beef sold in the US is imported.

We just consume way too much beef