The "Unintended consequences" of Animal Rights Legislation

Animal rights groups got bans adopted that to stop the slaughter of horses. So guess what? People started shipping the horses to Canada and Mexico "where, animal advocates say, they sometimes face more gruesome deaths [than the would have in the US]." The elimination of American slaughter houses have also:

The slaughterhouse closings themselves may have added to the population of the unwanted. In some parts of the country, auctioneers say, the closings have contributed to a drop in the price of horses at the low end of the market, and the added distance in the shipping of horses bound for slaughter, combined with higher fuel costs, means that some small or thin horses are no longer worth the fuel it takes to transport them.

The results are not too surprising to an economist.