I don't know all the ins and outs of what all has been brought up here, but I do know one thing. The Beef Check-off has helped.

I worked on helping to get it implemented many years ago. At that time, all the women's magazines BASHED beef. They targeted the housewife with this mistaken information. They could do that because there was no loss of revenue. After the Check-off and the Beef Council started running ads in Women's magazines, the beef bashing STOPPED because there was revenue at stake. I wish that isn't how it was, but that is the truth. I remember them running articles on Hollywood actors that wouldn't eat beef and how bad it was for you. That ceased...so whether you want to admit it or not the Check-off has  not been a waste of your $1/head. At that time, it was said, if we don't care to raise awareness of beef, who does????