Personally, I am sick of all the price gouging going on being blamed on oil.
As was pointed out, first it was steel. Let's look for a minute. Yup... when steel when up .17 a ton, we saw all the big price increases last year. For an industry that sat stagnant for years, this actually is significant.
I know it has gone up since, but look where the current prices of iron tools have gone in relation to price.
So, some quick math based on round fugures: Jet table saw (Powermatic, Delta, whatever, this is just an example) weighs in at 500 lbs. Soo... that means it used
1/4 of a ton, or 1/4 of our .17 cents increase. Rounding up, make it an even .05 to keep the math simple.
How is it that the average iron tools went up around $100 to $200 in the last 18 months? This started well before our current rate of fuel. I am wondering... did Jet and their compadres put a bit more of iron or steel in their machines?
If they did, our calculations should work approximately (I KNOW THEIR ARE OTHER VARIABLES, but work with me here) like this: If the steel went up .17 per ton, then to cover the $100 price increase on all small machinery across the board that was being blamed on steel, our example table saw would now weigh in accordingly:
$100 / .17 = 588.2 tons of iron. So using their logic (hey... its the price of steel... the Chinese are buying everything in sight) our table saw should weigh 588.2 tons, or 1,176,479 pounds!
Still buying off on that load of crap? Do any of these idiots put a pencil to this before they foister that line of crap off on the public? Change it to a dollar ton, or two dollars a ton, it is still ridiculous to say it was someone other than manufacturers and distributors.
Do the same with a quart of stain. How much of an oil product is in a quart that would make it go up so much? Certainly nothing along the lines you are talking about at a 58% increase.
I just wish these guys would own up to it. They are screwing all of us because they can. The end. No apology needed. No bogus yellow menace undermining our economy, and no crocodile tears and hand wringing.
Woodworking is and has been the fastest growing hobby segment in the US for years now. The demand is there, the pricing doesn't slow down the purchases, nor does the lack of quality. So why not bend us over a little more for the shareholders, eh?
What I wouldn't give to see someone at Jet (or any of the oil companies) say, "well, we actually raised the prices because we wanted to".
Robert