Canada: EXTERNAL AFFAIRS: Steakleggers

Bumper to bumper, thousands of Detroit cars nosed through the Detroit-Windsor tunnel. They were headed across the border for Canadian steaks. In Windsor, Vancouver, Niagara Falls and other border towns, Americans ate luscious two-inch steak dinners for $2 or less. U.S. newspapers, running pictures of the lucky feeders, made millions of meatless Americans drool last week.

But Canadian steaks could be eaten only in Canada. Most tourists could not take them across the line into the U.S. Reason: meat is rationed in Canada to one coupon (good for i to 3 Ibs., depending on the bone content) per person per week, and tourists had to stay at least seven days to get ration coupons. Tourists who tried to smuggle in meat were nabbed at customs. (One U.S. citizen who tried to take back $110 worth of meat had to give the meat away.) New York reporters, on meat-hunting assignments in Canada, found “a paradise of pork chops, housewife’s heaven.” (Canadian reporters, meat-hunting in New York, found that its steaks were rare.)

Canada still had meat because she had kept rationing, along with her price controls. Normally, Americans get more meat than Canadians (1946 estimated per capita consumption: American, 141 Ibs.; Canadian, 136 Ibs.). But Canada had not mismanaged her meat supply the way the U.S. had (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS). Now she had ample meat and low prices, stable at their ceilings (about 33¢ a Ib. for prime rib roast, 37¢ a Ib. for veal chops, 49¢^ a Ib. for porterhouse steak).