Kynoch
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Guns aren't more expensive today simply because of inflation. Not by a long shot.
The Remarkable Number of Factors Impacting Gun Prices
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Guns aren't more expensive today simply because of inflation. Not by a long shot.
frankenstein406
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Apple might take back orders but they cant just expand cause whats limiting them? Supply...
There's not many die makers if i remember yet and just because they made a hundred not all will work. there's a certain percentage of failing ones and many times they have contracts with other company's at the same time.
I believe it was at the foxconn plant where when steve enforced a even stricter quality control with no scratches that even the human eye couldn't see were deemed unusable.
this and very strict security led to the recent plant riots.
this idea of gun companies not wanting to expand being when boom dies down they are stuck is a bunch of bull. I have been in const 45 years and that is the definition of boom and bust not the monopolistic gun business. from 2000-20008 trillions of nails screw re-rods billions of yards of concrete gravel millions of tons of roof shingles well you get the idea. then a big collapse. I have not seen any manufacturers concrete plants etc go out of business after expanding
Kynoch
member
Pardon me?
Again, pardon me? Are you talking about tooling resources?
Apple's quality assurance plan is real world -- ISO 9000 or the like. Nothing magic about it. The key is sourcing, qualifying and keeping control of good vendors.
"Recent plant riots?" Are you talking about Apple's concern of using vendors that did not pay a living wage to their workers?
Potatohead
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Maybe i read something wrong, but I thought you said a Whopper is cheaper today than 30 years ago? Not at my BK
frankenstein406
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http://appleinsider.com/articles/12...mc_chip_supply_access_denied_report_says.html
http://whdi-reviews.com/2012/09/now-samsung-refuses-chips-to-apple/
http://computer.yourdictionary.com/die
apple doesn't care about its workers, mr "jobs" bragged how he had them wake up all the workers the night before release(they can't leave the plant) because he needed the screens switched to glass when his iphone was getting scratched by car keys in his pocket. he bragged how they only gave them a cup of tea(maybe bread to) and they were back to work in the middle of night when american workers could never do this.
About 5 million iPhone5's were sold in the first two months after introduction. (See http://statisticbrain.com/iphone-5-sales-statistics/)
If guns were sold in those volumes, you bet the gun manufacturers would be qualifying vendors and vendors would be beating a path to the doors to the manufacturers.
The sales volumes of firearms are just not there and the gun manufacturers cannot drive their supply chain market like Apple can. If I was a vendor, I work very hard for a few billion in sales with Apple versus a hundred thousand with Colt.
Anyone can dream that, like Micky Dees' burgers, billions and billions of firearms will be sold at fire sale prices, but it just will never happen. It did not happen before gun controls and certainly will not happen afterwards.
Kynoch
member
There is more than enough volume in guns to have great influence on suppliers. Not Apple-level influence, but more than enough. The real differences lay not in volume but how the different supply chains are developed and used. Apple doesn't build anything. It designs, purchases, markets, distributes and sells.
You've provided us with a false dichotomy. Very few (if any) build-to-print instrument contractors face the choice you have outlined, so that's a non-starter. Outsourcing manufacturing is another area where gun makers are impacted by the gov't, particularly with guns or even parts made offshore.
You're just tap-dancing around the subject of the thread. There is little question that if a company could make guns under the same gov't and societal restrictions/regulations/views as companies can make say power tools that guns would be a great deal cheaper to purchase today. Increased competition alone would demand that.
Further, long ago, Glock made the decision to sell their Glock 17 at what was in essence the going rate for pistols when they introduced it to the USA. Not H&K prices and not H&R prices but pretty much what was average for the time. Gaston Glock felt that he should sell them for a far lower (yet profitable) price to build market share but his US chief feared that people would think they were garbage based on their price. Whether or not that was a good idea, I submit that if Glock had adopted lower pricing from the beginning, the semi-auto pistol market would be fundamentally less expensive then it is today, even with the gov't regulations and restrictions.
Or Glock would have gone out of business as the US Chief feared and the auto pistol market would be just as it is today only without Glock hand guns. Since Glock did not experiment with a low cost pistol, it is a moot point.
I have covered this topic before.
The US firearm industry is one of the least competitive due to what amounts to protection from foreign competition as a result of legislation.
Many foreign companies actually produce thier guns in the United States because they can bypass some of it.
Handguns, both pistols and revolvers need to meet certain ATF point systems for import, including many features that are intended to increase cost.
A huge portion of the market is essentially reserved for US manufacturers because foreginers that must follow a point system domestic manufacturers do not have to cannot compete.
This includes many guns made to meet a price point balancing quality where the market wants, without the additional costs of features that score points that the consumer does not.
It also includes most of the mousegun market, as lower powered calibers and smaller guners score horribly.
The same goes for rifle competition due to 922r. Many of the most popular rifle designs are not legal to import in the most desirable configurations. This adds overhead to get them here and then convert them into what the market actually would want using parts manufactured in the USA at higher costs.
There is many similar factors.
For example China and Norinco cannot import into the USA. At a time when a huge majority and almost any other typical consumer product comes in an inexpensive manufactured in China format, firearms are specifically prohibited from import from China.
You can buy everything except guns and ammo from China.
There is of course also increased costs to firearm manufactures. These include political costs to keep thier product remaining legal. Legal costs to fight all sorts of things. How often does a power tool company get sued because a tool safely functions exactly as designed, but is used by someone that intentionally harms someone else with it?
How many people are trying to ban hammers or chain saws, and how often do tool companies have to fight to keep such products legal? Almost never.
Yet with guns such things are common.
In fact how many huge companies manufacturing all sorts of products also produce guns, as is done with many other products? Very few outside of some foreign state sponsored or operated ones, because they want to seperate the liability and problems involved in firearm manufacturing from the rest of a huge conglomerate.
Instead they are smaller independent companies that are almost solely involved in firearms.
Most of the costs of firearms are as a result related to legislative restrictions and limitations, and legal issues.
Without such restrictions the US firearm industry would be a lot less powerful, the guns mass produced from China and sold through Walmart would be 1/4 the price, would dominate the market, and many US firearm companies would downsize or go bankrupt. The market wanting higher quality would be a smaller niche market, and many would declare some chinese products were quite good and US manufactured guns were not worth 4x as much.
One downside to that is thier would be far less career options in the firearm field in the USA. They would be outsourced.
The firearm market in the USA has what most of the workers and unions in other industries would love and argue for. Things like being far more resistant to Free Trade agreements, and outsourced competition. It is a big reason it is one of the stronger manufacturing markets in the USA, it doesn't have to compete like most other industries.
The US firearm industry is one of the least competitive due to what amounts to protection from foreign competition as a result of legislation.
Many foreign companies actually produce thier guns in the United States because they can bypass some of it.
Handguns, both pistols and revolvers need to meet certain ATF point systems for import, including many features that are intended to increase cost.
A huge portion of the market is essentially reserved for US manufacturers because foreginers that must follow a point system domestic manufacturers do not have to cannot compete.
This includes many guns made to meet a price point balancing quality where the market wants, without the additional costs of features that score points that the consumer does not.
It also includes most of the mousegun market, as lower powered calibers and smaller guners score horribly.
The same goes for rifle competition due to 922r. Many of the most popular rifle designs are not legal to import in the most desirable configurations. This adds overhead to get them here and then convert them into what the market actually would want using parts manufactured in the USA at higher costs.
There is many similar factors.
For example China and Norinco cannot import into the USA. At a time when a huge majority and almost any other typical consumer product comes in an inexpensive manufactured in China format, firearms are specifically prohibited from import from China.
You can buy everything except guns and ammo from China.
There is of course also increased costs to firearm manufactures. These include political costs to keep thier product remaining legal. Legal costs to fight all sorts of things. How often does a power tool company get sued because a tool safely functions exactly as designed, but is used by someone that intentionally harms someone else with it?
How many people are trying to ban hammers or chain saws, and how often do tool companies have to fight to keep such products legal? Almost never.
Yet with guns such things are common.
In fact how many huge companies manufacturing all sorts of products also produce guns, as is done with many other products? Very few outside of some foreign state sponsored or operated ones, because they want to seperate the liability and problems involved in firearm manufacturing from the rest of a huge conglomerate.
Instead they are smaller independent companies that are almost solely involved in firearms.
Most of the costs of firearms are as a result related to legislative restrictions and limitations, and legal issues.
Without such restrictions the US firearm industry would be a lot less powerful, the guns mass produced from China and sold through Walmart would be 1/4 the price, would dominate the market, and many US firearm companies would downsize or go bankrupt. The market wanting higher quality would be a smaller niche market, and many would declare some chinese products were quite good and US manufactured guns were not worth 4x as much.
One downside to that is thier would be far less career options in the firearm field in the USA. They would be outsourced.
The firearm market in the USA has what most of the workers and unions in other industries would love and argue for. Things like being far more resistant to Free Trade agreements, and outsourced competition. It is a big reason it is one of the stronger manufacturing markets in the USA, it doesn't have to compete like most other industries.
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colorado_handgunner
Member
This is exactly why I am in favor of the current system. Some products are what should be considered "national security products". These you do not want to be in the control of a foreign power through importing. Firearms are one. Aircraft and ground armor are two others. Agriculture and energy also apply.
These products are inherent to preserving our way of life. Thus our government limits foreign competition to protect domestic sources through import restrictions (firearms) or tax breaks and subsidies (the other mentioned industries).
While I am a free market capitalist, I frankly do not have a problem with protectionism in certain industries, and actually support it.
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Huh?
How would allowing China to import firearms the way Canada does affect how the US military procures small arms? They recquire foreign companies like Beretta to open a factory in the states as part of the contract. I'm not sure how that's intertwined with civilians buying firearms commercially from China, Croatia, Turkey, whereever. Heck, civilians can already buy knock off M9s from Turkey or Brazil, just not from China. Which goes back to post #55, and I agree 100% with what Zoogster said. Up in Canada they're still importing Russian SVT-40s, Chinese commerical M14s, etc and they're getting them a LOT cheaper than we are.
How would allowing China to import firearms the way Canada does affect how the US military procures small arms? They recquire foreign companies like Beretta to open a factory in the states as part of the contract. I'm not sure how that's intertwined with civilians buying firearms commercially from China, Croatia, Turkey, whereever. Heck, civilians can already buy knock off M9s from Turkey or Brazil, just not from China. Which goes back to post #55, and I agree 100% with what Zoogster said. Up in Canada they're still importing Russian SVT-40s, Chinese commerical M14s, etc and they're getting them a LOT cheaper than we are.
Kynoch
member
No. Glock would not have went out of business if it sold its guns for a lower price. But lower price might well have agitated regulators like the US Gov't if the price was low enough, artificially limiting their sales. They would still have had military and LEO sales given the superiority of their product.
Glock does not sell auto pistols to the consumer market...
Glock already builds low cost pistols. This would be a matter of pricing the same models lower with tighter margins with the hope of increased sales.
Kynoch
member
I agree largely with what you're saying but it's more subtle than what you suggest. First, made in China (or Taiwan, Brazil, Turkey, etc.) does not necessarily equate to low quality. Nor does being made in the USA equate to high quality. Not by a long shot. This is particularly true with superbly designed guns like Glocks which amongst other things, allows for ease of production.
Even with all the import (and other) regulations I suspect there would be some very good money to be made selling largely imported firearms in the USA by established US companies using their extant marketing/sales/distribution/service systems were it not for the social stigma associated with making guns.
Again, there are all sorts of factors that impact the gun market. I think the reductionists view of some really miss a lot of the reasons that do impact the market.
Thanks for your input.
Kynoch
member
Impossible if you support the regulations and restrictions that currently impact guns. Protectionism is the antithesis of "free market capitalism."
Kynoch
member
True.
In fact, I suspect artificially controlling what is by far the largest consumer gun market in the world (the US) has actually crippled innovation which is also critical to a country's long term national security.
doc2rn
Member
We have that already, its called a Hi-Point and we all know how people feel about those guns. Love them or hate them, but they do get attacked from both sides of the political spectrum.
Kynoch
member
Naw.
You're equating product quality to sales price and that's not accurate.
As an example, if it wished to, Glock could still sell its guns at a much lower price while maintaining a margin that would still be enviable to many manufacturers.
Owen
Moderator Emeritus
I'm not sure they could. If the margin was significantly reduced, I would stop carrying them in my store. Considering the paperwork, record keeping requirements, and relatively low volume that guns sell at, the $20/gun i'd be reduced too wouldn't make it worthwhile for me to stock them.
oneounceload
member
They already do - all are made in China.
The story goes that when Glock sold his guns to NYPD, he sold them for $75 because they cost him $52 to make. If you can make a product for that cost and sell it for $500, why wouldn't you? If you do not like the prices, you have several choices -don't buy them, or go into business and make the better proverbial mousetrap. In calculating your costs, do not forget all of those nasty things like FET, import tariffs and duties, employee salaries, benefits and taxes, utility costs, transportation costs, Obamacare for his US employees, local, state and federal taxes, and that little thing called profit - which if stagnated like you seem to think it should be, would stop reinvestment and growth and innovation.
Some folks really have to take classes in basic business 101. This stuff comes up almost every week because folks think everything is too expensive for their shooting hobby. It is a HOBBY; if it is too expensive, cut your costs or do something else. Your anger about high prices should be going towards high gas and food prices and healthcare which affects you on a daily basis, not towards a hobby.......
still have it.Deer_Freak
Member.
Some guns have just went up with inflation. But some companies are flat out gouging us. Winchester shotguns used to be one of the cheapest brands, especially pumps. I bought a Model 70 Winchester rifle in the late 80's for $189. Manufacturing techniques are less labor intensive than they were in the 80's. Not to mention Winchester used better quality wood than they do today. Brownings cost about the same as in the 80's and yes, the quality has dropped.
oneounceload
member
Why aren't you factoring in all of the other associated costs that go into that gun? There is a LOT more than wood and manufacturing technique - especially since 1989. Do you still make the same salary as then? Does your food, gas, etc. cost the same as back then? How about healthcare, taxes, etc? These costs have also gone WAY up for businesses during this recent "Recession" since most folks like to think that businesses don't pay their fair share. Costs are UP on just about everything; demand is up; raw materials are up; etc.......
First without derailing this thread It is not gouging. There is another thread about gouging and if you want we can discuss why it is not gouging over there.
Second, costs of doing business have increased dramatically since the '80's. That gun, adjusting for inflation would be $387 today. But think about how much else has changed in the business world since then. Costs have gone up in many categories far faster than inflation. The two most extreme would be insurance and legal.
It is not fair to say that, because Winchester is charges far more today than they did in the '80s in real dollars, they must be making more money at a higher margin. That is incomplete at best.
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