I have an unpopular opinion that I’m sure nobody wants to hear. That opinion is that the shortages and price increases aren’t just happening to guns and ammo.
Nobody wants to hear it because we all need someone to be mad at whether it’s the ammo makers or re-sellers.
Everyone is pissed off at the ammo manufacturers and I’m sure there is some price gouging that is taking place at some level. I don’t deny that but also don’t think it is the main problem.
Rising costs on all commodities:
The problem, is that prices are rising across the board on all commodities, not just guns and ammo.
From ammo, medicine, food, building materials, fuel, and lumber — all have gone up to at least some degree. Some of those items have gone up more than others, but they have all gone up. For example, food prices on average went up 3.5 percent last year.
Food prices are also expected to rise another 1 to 2 percent. That’s more growth than is typically seen in a decade.
If that percentage seems low compared to the astronomical prices we’re currently paying for ammo, maybe you’re right. But, consider for a moment that the price of lumber has gone up 130% in under a year to take a different perspective.
Shipping costs are passed on:
And it’s going to continue to get worse before the prices on any commodities really start to come back down again. Part of the reason why this is true is because the cost to ship an item will continue to rise.
A gallon of fuel costs more now than it did just a year ago. And, there is no end in sight for that continual rise. The truckers can’t charge the same amount of money to ship goods based on lower fuel prices, so the price to ship will rise.
For the trucking companies to make money they have to raise their prices to ship those goods. Because that is true, the price increase is then passed on all the way down to the consumer level. Why? Because everyone in between also needs to make money.
If they don’t make money they go out of business.
At every level of business there are employees with families and mouths to feed. That is one of the reasons why so many people, like myself, were calling for the re-opening of the country. We don’t all need stimulus checks (though I know some people do), we need to get back to work.
And up until this point, we’ve just scratched the surface on what it takes to get a finished product to the consumer. We haven’t even started to talk about what it takes to get materials out of the ground. Or, what it takes to get materials shipped to the manufacturer to make the end product.
It all costs manpower and fuel.
Raw materials don’t jump out of the earth:
Farmers don’t just grow the food we eat, they have to harvest the food. In order to do that they need big machines that are diesel powered.
For lumber, they don’t just need to cut down the trees, they need the big machines to move them onto the truck. Then, they need the truck to move them down the road. This is followed by running more equipment to chop them up. Then, they need to move them again.
It all costs money. And it all costs manpower. It also all costs fuel. None of these are cheap, and the price is going up.
For ammunition, there are a lot of working parts. Powder, primers, casings, and projectiles. In order to get those things to Federal, Winchester, or one of the others — a lot needs to happen. Raw materials need to be taken out of the ground to make the lead, copper, brass, and some of the powder components.
Those things don’t just pop up out of the ground, you need machines that run on expensive diesel to go in and get that stuff. Then it has to be refined before you can ever put it together. Oh, and in order to do any of that you have to move it around which requires, you guessed it, diesel trucks.
Guns and ammo industry changed:
At every step there are costs. Those costs are on the rise and show no signs of slowing down. The difference is that the other industries didn’t change. People always needed to eat food. There have always been a certain number of homes being built each year.
There has always been a certain number of cars on the road and a certain amount of people who need certain kinds of medicine. Granted, they are on the upward trend as people generally live to older ages and require more medicine … but it’s gradual.
Something that has changed drastically in just one short year is the amount of new gun owners.
When you add 8.5 million new gun owners to the mix who are afraid of a pandemic, violence in the streets, the defunding of police, etc., you get an even smaller supply of ammo to an already increasing price.
When people see the rising prices along with the decreased supply it scares people even more. Then, instead of people posting pictures of their new guns on their favorite social media outlet, they’re posting pics of their ammo score.
This drives more fear as we all take part in each other’s shortages and price increases.
If you need ammo, here is my best tip to find it right now. But when you buy it, keep it to yourself. Don’t keep stoking fear.
I’m guilty of this too. On my YouTube channel I posted a video of me walking around one of the stores recording the empty shelves. That was stupid of me and I won’t be doing it again.
Conclusion:
I’m sure there are some reading this who will disbelieve everything I’ve said. That’s fine because I believe what I said above to be true. Maybe simple economics isn’t the problem at every step of the way, because you do have people scalping ammo and re-selling it for more than they should be.
I don’t deny that. But the problem, the main problem, has started elsewhere long before it ever reaches their hands.
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