This has been great learning lesson for me.

[mav]

Being still somewhat of a newbie to firearms (< 4 years), I have never experienced anything like I have witnessed over the last several days.  Almost everything firearm related is out of stock, certainly in the case of ARs.  People have gone mad, and the price be damned.  I have seen ARs sell for upwards of $2k more than regular price, magazines sell for 5-10x more than normal price.  It is just crazy.

 

I find all of this very troubling when I think about what would happen if we got into a real SHTF scenario, such as food or energy shortage, financial collapse, etc...  If people freak out over guns, I couldn't imagine what they would do if it was over something they needed to live.

 

I have my tin foil hat on here. Based on the recent frantic behavior I have seen of people, I have wondered if the fed knows something we don't, hence the purchasing of millions of rounds of ammo by DHS.

 

Was the run up to the 90s AWB anything like what we are seeing now?

[MacGyver]

Dont kid yourself.  Our society, despite its modern veneer is but a few days from killing one another over cigarettes and toilet paper.

[mcurrier]

Dont kid yourself.  Our society, despite its modern veneer is but a few days from killing one another over cigarettes and toilet paper.

Many of us have attempted to point that out, but we're labeled to be "tin foil"...

 

Seriously, grocery stores have 3-4 days of inventory under normal circumstances...

[gregintenn]

A food shortage would be quite a show, wouldn't it?

[UncleJak]

Dont kid yourself.  Our society, despite its modern veneer is but a few days from killing one another over cigarettes and toilet paper.

Well put.

[RobertY]

I do know that yesterday my wife and I went out.

 

First to Gander Mountain on Turkey Creek to have the scope mounted and bore sighted on my Marlin model 795. Keep in mind this was early afternoon. It was crazy in the fire arm department. I thought it was bad during thier Thanksgiving sale. Heck, this was much worse. Had to take a number and wait and wait and wait. People were gobbling up fire arms, ammo, and accesories like there was tomorrow. My wife got shoved out of the way more than a few times when she was looking at ammo. I was stuck at the counter listening for my number to be called. She is small (5 foot even), but she is a stick of dynomite. Everytime she was shoved I cringed feeling bad for the person that had "moved" her out of the way because I was expecting her to fly all over them. Thankfully she held her cool and we were not asked to leave by security. Got the scope mounted and got out of there because I did not feel like tempting the fates.

 

Second stop was the Gun place on Watt Road. We have been pricing 9mm's to add a cc 9 to what we have. That place is small to beging with. You could barely squeeze in. We wound up leaving there also because we could not get waited on.

 

It's NUTZ!

[TNTop]

Yes I too am truly amazed but total collapse is going to be much much worst. All the guns bought will be shooting people for food. Humans are just caged animals but you will see the animal come out if there is a collapse of the economy or some other major event.

[sgjay]

The Saturday after Obama got elected in 08 I went looking for an AR 15. Every place I went either was sold out or the prices were jacked way up. I finally ended up at Tennessee Gun Country. The guy behind the counter laughed when I told him what I was trying to buy. "Good luck!" he said. Then he took pity on me and pulled a Bushmaster lower from under the counter. I immediately bought it (for the MSRP!). They now have me as a customer for life! It still took me months to get an upper to complete the rifle. I fear that this will be worse.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Mav, as best I recall it was exactly the same in late 2008 and most of 2009, especially the first few months of 2009. Don't have to go all the way back to the AWB for appropriate analogous situation.

 

I recall spending HOURS on the internet just to find somebody with a few hundred in-stock bullets that I could use. Even dropping standards to more expensive AND the wrong weight AND the wrong configuration, it was near impossible.

[mav]

Mav, as best I recall it was exactly the same in late 2008 and most of 2009, especially the first few months of 2009. Don't have to go all the way back to the AWB for appropriate analogous situation.

 

I recall spending HOURS on the internet just to find somebody with a few hundred in-stock bullets that I could use. Even dropping standards to more expensive AND the wrong weight AND the wrong configuration, it was near impossible.

 

Ah.  I have no frame of reference.  My very first firearm purchase was mid-2009, and at that time, I had no problem getting whatever I wanted.  I would say that has been the case until this past Friday.  This has been my first experience of mass scale panic buying, and it was rather shocking.  I am still stunned that people will pay in some cases over twice the list price for rifle.  For example, a LWRC REPR is already an expensive rifle, and to see people paying $5k or more for it just seems nuts.

[swim615]

It reminds me of the gas shortage during Katrina, I stopped at my regular gas station on the way home from work and they were sold out. Two gas stations later I was in line behind several cars and saw a man in a car filling up gas cans and saying he was going home to get his other car and filling it up to. I asked him what was going on and he told me about the shortage :ugh: who knew it was news to me but I had trouble finding gas for sometime after that and the prices :stunned: well you know are still unreal. Glad I only use about 25 gallons per day in my truck and mowers. Just floored by the prices still. :surrender:

If it weren't for the internet I wouldn't know about the shortage now. Thank goodness for the internet. :woohoo: Edited December 20, 2012 by swim615

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Ah.  I have no frame of reference.  My very first firearm purchase was mid-2009, and at that time, I had no problem getting whatever I wanted.  I would say that has been the case until this past Friday.  This has been my first experience of mass scale panic buying, and it was rather shocking.  I am still stunned that people will pay in some cases over twice the list price for rifle.  For example, a LWRC REPR is already an expensive rifle, and to see people paying $5k or more for it just seems nuts.

Hi Mav

 

It may very well be worse right now than 2008-2009. I just recalled the stuff I wanted being unobtanium, and I don't recall any kind of crummy worn-out AR fer sail much cheaper than maybe $1200 for awhile.

 

A possibility, maybe I'm misjudging it-- I don't think prices and availability EVER recovered to pre-2008 levels in the last 4 years. It was only the last year or so that it was pretty easy to buy lots of bullets and primers, exactly the brand and config you were looking for, and I think the price had creeped up to a "new normal" higher than pre-2008, even accounting for inflation. Mebbe I'm wrong, but with you starting four years ago, it was only "kinda close to pre-2008 normal" for about the last year. So 2011 and early 2012 might be "closest to normal" out of the last 4 years.

 

Obama is the best gun and ammo salesman EVER! Lots better than Bill Clinton, and Bill was a pretty good gun salesman his self. :)