[TowerTalk] US Tower price increase

[Jim Brown]

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 at 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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