It's been many years since I had any involvement with beef production (I'm FROM Missouri, and went to school with a lot of farmers, in farm country). My experience was not with ranchers, but farmers who keep some head of cattle for personal consumption and a hedge for poor crop years. I did some research to refresh my recollection, but the numbers seem close to the same, ratio-wise. (A lot of inflation since my youth.)

It takes about a year to a year and a half to raise a calf to slaughter. A weaned calf sells for about $150/cwt. At, say, 400 lbs, about $600/head. A full grown head of cattle is 1000+lbs bigger. So, the profit is made between slaughter prices and costs of raising. For ranchers it's a little different, because they generally breed the cattle, meaning they don't buy, but sell the calves. Their costs are in silage, vet fees, etc. Grazing on leased land is a small percentage of the cost but it's a trade-off - low feed costs, but higher losses. Typically 82-85% of the herd makes it to market.

The Bundys are basically operating like Trump - stiffing the contractors to make more money. In this case, the government is the contractor (leased land/grazing fees). Even at $1.69 AUM ($1.69 per month per head) that's only about $12-17 per head for grazing for the year. That's an extremely small percentage of the cost/value for raising a head of cattle (average sale price for slaughter beef was $120+/- per cwt last week). So, buy a calf for $600, sell for $1650=$1050/head. Of that $15 is "grazing fees." Who's getting ripped off here?