Inflation strikes the shooting sports

[Ken Hill]

They are raising "vapor" because there still is nothing on the shelves.

Ken

[Dean Romig]

Do we all remember the gasoline and heating oil shortage of '73 - '74 (where the tankers were sitting just offshore) when the shortage was 'invented' simply to boost the prices (profits for the oil companies) before the "shortage ended?.... I do!





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[J.B. Books]

Originally Posted by Dean Romig

Do we all remember the gasoline and heating oil shortage of '73 - '74 (where the tankers were sitting just offshore) when the shortage was 'invented' simply to boost the prices (profits for the oil companies) before the "shortage ended?.... I do!





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That was when oil was used as an economic weapon for the US support of Israel following the Yom Kippur War. OPEC was unified. OPEC reduced production, increased the price off crude and cut shipments to the U.S.
Are you suggesting the ammo manufacturers are doing the same thing and there are boatloads of ammo and components being deliberately withheld from the market? I think there is something different going on.

[William Davis]

For some time Roto Metals has been my shot source when local shop is out of stock. Year ago was buying 2 bags with shipping included just under 100 dollars. Few months ago 110 dollars. Order delivered yesterday 130 dollars, all round figures .

Post office priority mail went up a couple of bucks, Roto has to charge state sales tax now. About 6 dollars. In a year scrap lead has gone from around 1700 dollars a ton to 2100 now back down to 2000 let’s call it 15 % increase

Taken as a whole shot by itself Roto’s not gouging. Disturbing trend and one we will see more of everything is going up. Shot the least of it. Gas & target fees, primers and powder if you could find them. The sport is getting getting more expensive no way around it.

William

[Dean Romig]

No Pete. I probably chose the wrong crisis to exemplify my point. The point is - never let a good crisis go to waste. The shortages, compounded by the Covid situation the world is in, any shortage in fact, is the perfect time to bump prices. And another reason why prices are inflated is because PEOPLE WILL PAY THOSE PRICES.





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[J.B. Books]

Originally Posted by Dean Romig

No Pete. I probably chose the wrong crisis to exemplify my point. The point is - never let a good crisis go to waste. The shortages, compounded by the Covid situation the world is in, any shortage in fact, is the perfect time to bump prices. And another reason why prices are inflated is because PEOPLE WILL PAY THOSE PRICES.





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Supply and demand is certainly part of the problem. I also believe an abundance of available money is another factor, combine the historic low interest rates with a massive amount of money flooding the economy and a government monetizing it's debt has combined to create the perfect storm for inflation. It seemed to be limited to real estate initially, then it moved to lumber but now lots of commodities are increasing in price. I am looking at putting new tires on my truck, Hankook just announced a 5% increase on light truck tires this past week. Everyday I seem to be seeing these announcements of prices increases. Question is, will it be temporary or a return to the 1970's, time will tell. Regardless empty shelves for ammunition and reloading components dragging on for months is very troubling if you are a shooter.

[Terry Hobson]

Yes, if I remember from Economics class the classic cause if inflation is "to much money chasing to few goods".

[Dean Romig]

And, if we think it’s bad now - just wait until the $15/hr. minimum wage is adopted in a good number of states... we can’t for one minute think businesses and corporations are just going to absorb those costs... the buying public will be paying every cent of a minimum wage increase.





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[Richard Flanders]

I've come to the conclusion that most of our commodity prices are not fluctuating "organically". This is not a case of supply and demand for the most part. Someone is manipulating them somehow. Copper prices have been going up since at least 1960 when it was .29/#. There was a huge leap up around in ~2002 when the Chinese decided to build huge cities that no one moved into; once that failed attempt was over, copper plummeted then started climbing back up. For the past 10yrs it has a trendline of dropping slowly. I make my living exploring for metals and the prices often just cannot be figured out using a supply/demand system. What's going on with precious metals these days makes no sense at all on a supply/demand system, especially if you include the stock markets in your observations. Everyone in the mining industry is shaking their heads in disbelief and stumbling to explain any of it logically, and none of their explanations make any sense at all, which throws a serious monkey wrench into any exploration and development plans a mining company is trying to put together. It all stinks of manipulation. There are charts like this one below for all the metals and for crude oil for anyone interested.

https://www.macrotrends.net/1476/cop...cal-chart-data

[Mike of the Mountain]

Everything is going up. Have you looked at building supplies lately? They have gone up more than 7%. With the current state of affairs I don't see this ending any time soon. We are being played.