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Originally Posted by sandhunter
A new thread to talk about Guns and Ammo , gun violence and legislation , the other thread is now closed and all the discussion will move to this thread.
First thanks to Mal Hombre and SanteeFats for help with title of this thread
For the last several years I kept hearing rumors of the Govt. rationing 22lr ammo , I asked why 22lr , as yes it is deadly but no one I know uses this caliber for protection , we use it shoot off out in the desert as it is very cheap to buy , I was told this caliber is actually very popular in the inner cities ,
Last week I ordered 5 bricks of 22lr and my order was accepted and charged and then I received an e-mail telling me my first 3 bricks would ship the next day but the other 2 would ship after a 30 day waiting period , this is crazy as my brother bought 5000 rds of 9mm from the same company and they shipped his all in one shipment ,
Two different calibers and the same quantity but the smaller caliber is rationed
Now the next part of this rumor is the Govt. was buying up the difference in quantity from the manufactures , whether this is true I don't know 
I am not a conspiracy theorist nut , sometimes rumors are based in fact. |
There was an article in the NRA's monthly magazine several years ago about this. Yes, I am a lifetime member of the NRA. I always give those magazines away to someone, so I can't go back and reread the thing to refresh my memory. The gist of the article was something like this.
There are a limited number of ammunition manufacturers in the US. I don't remember the exact number, but it's only around half a dozen or so. When the war/wars started military needs took precedence over all other ammunition. Those ammunition manufacturers were running 24/7 to try and keep up with the greatly increased demand of the military, along with the normal needs of the public. The only way the manufacturers could keep up with the demand would've been to have built new facilities, purchased new equipment, and then train X number of new employees. But, if in the future, as would eventually happen, the demands of the military decreased, the manufacturers would be stuck with buildings, equipment, and employees they didn't need. Which doesn't make good financial sense. Something had to be pushed off the end of the production list...and that was 22 ammo. At the same time as 22 ammo production decreased, and 22 ammo became harder to find, people started to horde the stuff because it was becoming scarce, which compounded the issue.
I would reiterate that the source of that story is the NRA. I know a lot of people think some big Obama conspiracy is going on in regards to ammunition prices/shortages. I seriously doubt that the NRA would be defending the Obama administration if the truth was otherwise. I have noticed that 5.56 and other military caliber ammo has not increased in price anywhere near the rate that 22 ammo has. It's gotten, at least around here, where 22 ammo is going for almost the same price per round as 5.56 ammo is.