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Re: [TowerTalk] US Tower price increase

To: towertalk@contesting.com
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] US Tower price increase
From: Jim Brown <jim@audiosystemsgroup.com>
Reply-to: jim@audiosystemsgroup.com
Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2017 11:38:47 -0800
List-post: <towertalk@contesting.com">mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
Great response, Jim. BUT -- the increase noted by the original poster was that the increase was overnight!

Several possible reasons for this. One is that business operations for the ham market are often supported by higher volume and higher margin operations for other markets. When those other markets fall apart, they no longer support the ham market, or contribute to economies of scale that allow lower prices.

Another is corporate mergers, which can change business priorities, change where products are manufactured.

But assuming corporate greed as the reason for all such price increases is unreasonable. It certainly can be, but there are many other reasons.

73, Jim K9YC

On Mon,1/2/2017 11:13 AM, jimlux wrote:
On 1/2/17 10:50 AM, john@kk9a.com wrote:
Wow! I bought one of these new in the 80's for considerably less than last
year's pricing from Texas Towers.  It would now be unaffordable.  Does
anyone else sell US Towers besides HRO? I guess used pricing will also go
up considerably.


1985 to 2016 is 1:2.26 just from inflation. I would suspect things made by mostly hand labor and steel would go up faster: it's not like a radio or computer, where you get economies of scale and lower cost from higher levels of integration. A $1000 radio today is MUCH more capable than a $1000 radio in 1985 over a broad spectrum of capabilities, and is less than half the price, in 1985 dollars.

However a tower is basically the same thing, but made by people whose wages have gone up, with raw materials the price which has risen, and trucked by companies where the vehicle, labor, and fuel costs have gone up.

Oil in 1985 $15/bbl, today $30/bbl (and it was pushing $100/bbl not too long ago), roughly tracks inflation

Manufacturing wages roughly doubled roughly tracking inflation- although that's tricky, because large unionized mfrs have a large effect on average wage calculations

Steel was $15/cwt in 1985, runs 45-50/cwt now.. the USGS analysis says that the various finanicial crises drove this increase (that is, mining iron didn't cost more.. making steel did, for various reasons) (cwt = 100 lb)

Some manufactured goods have become more expensive because of debt service: the company took on debt to expand or stay in business, so now the end price includes interest, as well as the cost of raw materials and manufacturing cost.
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