As others have stated, early 2000s 9mm was 10¢/rd, 45acp 20¢, 5.56 20¢ (10 for steel 223 or 7.62x39). Let's not even talk about surplus 308, 30-06, 8mm, x54, etc.
Trump era "salad days":
9mm, x39: 20¢, 45acp, 5.56: 30¢
Sometimes you could get sales for 5¢ less than all these prices.
Now best case scenario:
9mm 25¢, 45acp, 5.56 40¢
7.62x39: what's that?
Now just to keep it all relative, I make double what I did 15-20 years ago, my net worth is 20x, and my cost of living is 4x what it was then (single compared to family of 6). I don't shoot as high volume but, like everything else, we shooters will have to adjust our scale of what is a good deal.
Also, I just finally ordered a decent thermal (agm ts25-384v2). I couldn't get close to this kind of nv performance 15 years ago for the cost of 7 cases of 9mm. Decent ARs cost less now than they did then.
Trump era "salad days":
9mm, x39: 20¢, 45acp, 5.56: 30¢
Sometimes you could get sales for 5¢ less than all these prices.
Now best case scenario:
9mm 25¢, 45acp, 5.56 40¢
7.62x39: what's that?
Now just to keep it all relative, I make double what I did 15-20 years ago, my net worth is 20x, and my cost of living is 4x what it was then (single compared to family of 6). I don't shoot as high volume but, like everything else, we shooters will have to adjust our scale of what is a good deal.
Also, I just finally ordered a decent thermal (agm ts25-384v2). I couldn't get close to this kind of nv performance 15 years ago for the cost of 7 cases of 9mm. Decent ARs cost less now than they did then.
