Beef stew is a mood. It is Sunday, a Dutch oven, and the idea that dinner is serious. Nobody writes folk songs about pork stew. That is marketing, not cooking.
The cut that actually goes in the pot is not a steak. It is shoulder. On the beef side that is chuck short ribs. On the pork side that is boneless country-style ribs — which are not ribs. They are strips of pork shoulder. Same kind of meat: fat, collagen, time.
The money
Chuck short ribs are a luxury grocery item dressed as peasant food. Country-style pork is still priced like food. In a lot of stores the pork is half, or close to half, the cost of the beef. You brown it the same way. You do not get a medal for the expensive package.
A shrinking cattle herd and a large hog supply are already on the receipt. Americans still buy the cow out of habit. That habit is the un-American part: we raise the pig in bulk and then apologize for putting it in the pot.
What you taste
Beef stew is darker and heavier. The broth goes glossy and sticks to the spoon. One bowl is a meal that sits on you.
Pork stew is lighter and a little sweeter. It takes onion, garlic, mustard, cabbage, apple, paprika, or a splash of vinegar without a fight. It does not pretend to be prime rib. It pretends to be dinner.
Neither is diet food. Both need a skim of fat off the top. Beef still wins if what you want is iron and that specific chuck flavor. Pork wins if what you want is the same method on a Tuesday budget.