If you’re buying eggs covered in excrement, that’s on you. That’s what the law is for: for the seller and producer not being able to hide the awful conditions in which the eggs were produced. If you want clean eggs, buy clean eggs, which will then necessarily have been produced in a clean environment, more healthy for the chickens, and also with less risk of contaminated eggs.
Exactly this. I have chickens and when I collect the eggs they are usually completely clean. Only if I start to slack on cleaning the coop or one of the chickens gets sick do the eggs get dirty.
I can imagine most eggs sold in the United States would be horrifying if not washed.
The size of the nestbox can be a factor as well. If the nestbox is too large for the breed of chicken you keep, it encourages them to hang out inside it, and they walk on the eggs and get them dirty.
If a nestbox is the right size, it will only be used for laying eggs (and occasional brooding).
What changed is that the USDA discovered how to wash eggs properly and so mandated the method by which eggs must be washed, while Europe went the complete opposite direction and decided to outlaw washing eggs (prior to sale) but encouraged/mandated that chickens get vaccinated for salmonella (which is not required in the U.S.).
