All of the political attention towards firearms has caused a surge in demand for weapons throughout 2012. Some manufacturers are actually having a tough time finding enough manpower to keep up pace with demands and are offering relatively high wages to attract workers. The firearms industry is competing with the oil boom in the Dakotas and Gulf region for workers which is also driving the wages up. For example, DRT, an ammunition manufacturer in Missouri is offering $17 an hour to workers to help meet the souring demand for bullets. Mike Weddle, head of maintenance at DRT, stated that demand has almost quadrupled in the last year and he is considering opening up a third facility and adding more shifts to catch up on orders. Most of the recent hires in the weapons industry are contract-type hires instead of permanent, long term hires because no one is quite sure how long the demand is going to stay at such high rates for. Gun engineers are also looking at 6 figure salaries with the current boom in gun demand because gun collectors are looking for any reason to buy new weapons and these designers provide the answer with new designs, safeties, frames, triggers, etc. All of the recent press around America's firearm "issues" has without a doubt created a surge in the industry and seems to be giving the economy a little kick when it needs it most.
http://money.cnn.com/2013/03/25/news/companies/guns-ammo-jobs/index.html?iid=HP_River
This is a great topic and its true this is a good boost for the economy. Ive realized that when the government tries to take more control from the people their seems to be an economical boom in some industry that is against the government taking more control. Tragedies such as 9/11 created economic boom because of the war, the same way gun control has created a mass surge of demand for the weapon. Some times you have to wonder if they plan it that way or they just naturally come hand in hand the government just takes the opportunity to boost the economy.
ReplyDeleteI'm a little confused... you say demand is "souring" and then talk about how well the market is doing. Which one is it?
ReplyDeleteEven with all the tragedies, bad publicity is still publicity. Even with all the attempted gun control legislature coming into play people are still scrambling buy and guns and ammo they can. One example of this is shortly after the Newton shooting the Bushmaster AR-15 assault rifle almost tripled in price along with high capacity magazines, stores could barely keep ammunition on the shelves. What most people also tend to forget is that a very large chunk of the US's exports come from the selling of weapons and military assets to foreign countries. We are the biggest arms dealer in the world.
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