Scalpers are out of control

[Calvin45]

No, the free market is designed to have equilibrium. The manufacturers are certainly considering expanding capacity but they have to balance that out with having underutilized factories when things settle down. If prices stay this high competition will enter due to attractive margins and that will drive things down to equilibrium.

We all know this market...things go from equilibrium to incredibly scarce with, often times, little to no warning. We need to adjust our behavior and know how to compete as buyers in this market or we will be faced with a choice of making due with what we have, using a substitute powder, or paying outrageous prices.

I paid $90 for primers, which is outrageous in some ways at 3x the price, but for me the $60 wasn't a large price to pay to be fully equipped with all the components I will need for a few years with each of my rifles.

I know this is true, mostly seeing some humor in the situation. It is indeed a feast/famine market and economy. All the more in this COVID season, brings out the crazy in people - I recall when the panic buying started someone on one of the threads offered (jokingly I hope) to trade an 8lb keg of h-1000 for a palate of toilet paper!. Interesting times for sure.

 

[The Oregonian]

I know this is true, mostly seeing some humor in the situation. It is indeed a feast/famine market and economy. All the more in this COVID season, brings out the crazy in people - I recall when the panic buying started someone on one of the threads offered (jokingly I hope) to trade an 8lb keg of h-1000 for a palate of toilet paper!. Interesting times for sure.

Yep...the people I feel bad for are people with a new rifle, cartridge, etc, who are searching for components that they didn't previously need and just want to get what they need for their new rig.

 

[338jedaw]

I agree the hoarders are out of control.

 

[Coldfinger]

Each time I went to gun shows I picked up powder and primers. Purchased bullets when they were available and now able to go out and do what I love and that's shoot, shoot and shoot.

I buy powder bullets brass and primers whenever I have the spare money. Hopefully I'll have enough stock for my boys to enjoy in few years! I can't make that picture up he's 6 getting ready for his first out of state hunt!! What are most 6 year olds doing at 0800? Sorry to hijack a thread. If anyone wants to buy my H1000 I'll sell it at an enormous profit!!!!

 

[JakeC]

I don't know about everyone, but anyone that's taken a dime from SS, farm stipends, or or host of other socialized programs, has taken part is socialized policies and yet, we rely on capitalism and always have.
I don't see how the ethics of pricing shooting components has to do with either, as though it's another political war that people seem to need.

Right, Or taken help from medicare, a firefighter, LEO, librarian, teacher, code officer, etc. Even AAA and blue cross are semi-private socialized providers. Just slamming anything promoting fairness as "socialist" is unhelpful when what people are clearly worried about is 2A rights being hampered by hoarding, gluttonous behavior on the one hand and the wealth of the few on the other. Should my access to a right be determined by the market or the constitution? Should I only be allowed access to self defense If I have the paranoia or luxury to panic buy or hoard?

 

[The Oregonian]

Hoarding is all relative. Most casual shooters or reloaders would probably call people on here hoarders.

 

[DDWing]

Yet you did.

A risky investment which few will capitalize on. Look at the 22LR hoarders following Sandy Hook. I note 22LR is hard to find now. Having ~15K if it, ir ~7K of 223, 4K of 308, and ~1 to 2K of almost every other round I shoot, in loaded rounds and components, I don't think of myself as a hoarder. I fully expect to shoot it all.
With what we have, we can choose profit or break even. A buddy needed some RL7, sold him 1.5lbs for $30. My gun doesn't like it, he needed it. He does the same in return.


I would say, if you take more than you put in, it is socialism. That it is a forced tax also makes it socialism.

But it isn't a forced tax. You actually don't have to pay SS tax, but you can't draw it after retirement if you don't.

 

[grouse]

Right, Or taken help from medicare, a firefighter, LEO, librarian, teacher, code officer, etc. Even AAA and blue cross are semi-private socialized providers. Just slamming anything promoting fairness as "socialist" is unhelpful when what people are clearly worried about is 2A rights being hampered by hoarding, gluttonous behavior on the one hand and the wealth of the few on the other. Should my access to a right be determined by the market or the constitution? Should I only be allowed access to self defense If I have the paranoia or luxury to panic buy or hoard?

Listen. You can't come here with logical arguments. Socialism is the new 4 letter word and One of the candidates is using it as a scare tactic, when half the people don't understand we already live in mixed economy with elements of both.

 

[JakeC]

Hoarding is all relative. Most casual shooters or reloaders would probably call people on here hoarders.

That's fair and almost certainly true. I don't think someone paying 2.5 cents per grain of H1000 is a casual reloader though.

 

[P7M13]

But it isn't a forced tax. You actually don't have to pay SS tax, but you can't draw it after retirement if you don't.

IIRC, case law doesn't support your argument. I'd like to see USC§ code references where that is outlined.
Be self employed and try to get out of the obligatory 7.5%.

 

[DDWing]

IIRC, case law doesn't support your argument. I'd like to see USC§ code references where that is outlined.
Be self employed and try to get out of the obligatory 7.5%.

I am self employed. Have been for 49 years.

 

[Treeslug]

It is free market supply and demand, nothing more and nothing less.

You are from Oregon and that is all you have to say?

 

[redleg1013]

Yes, the traditional scalpers can be a disservice to the community. I remember back in 2012 a guy was at the counter buying six bricks (500 rounds) of 22lr and laughing about how he didn't have a 22 but it was going to finance his next scope, and I remember thinking, how it would be just terrible if he got mugged on the way to his car... people like this need to be strung up by their ankles, stripped naked and fed a steady diet of Ex-Lax.

The other side of the coin are those that have more money than sense and pay these exorbitant prices, and yes, I am aware that some scalpers will use friends or dummy accounts to bid up items.

The *SINGLE* takeaway from this that the market of our hobby/lifestyle is very volatile, and yet we have members that are utterly shocked when it happens again in another election year (I hesitate to say that they deserve to get fleeced, but they kinda do). Plan ahead, when you buy supplies, get just a little extra *every* time; like an extra 1k primers, or an extra pound of powder, whatever, pack it away and forget you have it.

 

[okie man]

I have a couple thousand federal match primers and was looking at New bass boats! Let's hear some offers! Lol