Skyrocketing lumber prices in the USA (180%+ increase in one year) and the reasons why.

[BobPalma]

If some materials are problematic for recycling, then manufacturers should be required to use other types of materials that are more feasible for recycling.
In some instances, it may be better to put some types of liquid merchandise in reusable containers, such as laundry detergent or motor oil (when the container is empty, take it back to the store for a refill). In this instance, a store attendant would take your container and refill it from the appropriate 55-gallon barrel, one of a variety of barrels situated along the back wall of the store. If some thought and common sense were put into resolving the issues that we have with waste and recyclables, society would benefit greatly.

That would be "back to the fifties," Brent....you know, that time in our nation's history that is said to have been "so wasteful." Yeah, right.

To wit: I remember the largest hardware store on the square in Paris IL, where I grew up in the '50s. In the back room were several 55-gallon drums of various products like mineral spirits, turpentine, etc. You brought in your own container, glass was OK!, and they'd fill it and charge you according to the size of the container.

Further, that practice encouraged entrepreneurship (gasp, such a concept!) for youngsters such as me.

The hardware store needed empty vessels for people who came in with no container. So, the hardware store paid kids 5 cents per bottle to bring in empties from in back of bars around town...liquor bottles and such; even those with cork caps were OK. We'd scrounge around the back of bars, hoping to find boxes of a dozen or more empties, and take them to the hardware store to earn money. Such a glorious concept in self-sufficiency, eh?

Not to mention picking up and returning deposit pop bottles to the grocery store for the 5-cent refund, too.

They don't call 'em "the good old days" for nothing, you know...'lots to learn there if a culture would pay attention to history and not find excuses of "why it wouldn't work today," most of which have to do with the excess number of barristers in the country.

That's my story and I'm striking to it. BP

[Milaca]

That would be "back to the fifties," Brent....you know, that time in our nation's history that is said to have been "so wasteful." Yeah, right.

To wit: I remember the largest hardware store on the square in Paris IL, where I grew up in the '50s. In the back room were several 55-gallon drums of various products like mineral spirits, turpentine, etc. You brought in your own container, glass was OK!, and they'd fill it and charge you according to the size of the container.

Further, that practice encouraged entrepreneurship (gasp, such a concept!) for youngsters such as me.

The hardware store needed empty vessels for people who came in with no container. So, the hardware store paid kids 5 cents per bottle to bring in empties from in back of bars around town...liquor bottles and such; even those with cork caps were OK. We'd scrounge around the back of bars, hoping to find boxes of a dozen or more empties, and take them to the hardware store to earn money. Such a glorious concept in self-sufficiency, eh?

Not to mention picking up and returning deposit pop bottles to the grocery store for the 5-cent refund, too.

They don't call 'em "the good old days" for nothing, you know...'lots to learn there if a culture would pay attention to history and not find excuses of "why it wouldn't work today," most of which have to do with the excess number of barristers in the country.

That's my story and I'm striking to it. BP

Wonderful story BP, I only hope that it will reach a larger audience as it may be the solution to some of our massive problems. Less waste and less energy consumed in the process.

It often seems that we are awaiting a high-tech solution to a problem, when all we need to do is look back in history to find a simple no-tech solution. If it worked well back then, it can work well now!

[Gunslinger]

Very true...not only did we earn some money picking up bottles off the side of the road and taking them to the local grocery stores for money I well remember the milkman delivering milk in reusable bottles to our home...there was an insulated box outside the back door where he took the used bottles and left new cold bottles of milk. It wasn't until I graduated high school and left for college before my mom discontinued that service.

We all know "junkyards" for old cars were really recycling centers where cars were stripped by customers of usable parts and what was left was reprocessed and recycled. They've more or less been legislated out of existence in many areas.

In WWII car bumpers, tires, cooking fat and many other items were recycled for the war effort.

My uncle, who was in the first wave on Omaha Beach used to talk about how the Army engineers and officers had trouble coming up with solutions to immediate problems such as the hedgerows in Normandy. He said the officers and engineers too often were stuck in their formal educational mode of thinking things through, designing and testing to overcome battlefield problems. My uncle said it usually was the farm boy soldiers that came up with solutions...they farmed during the Depression and used what they had to overcome a problem whether an "elegant" engineering solution or not. That's the epitome of recycling.

People today with no real memory or knowledge of what went before think they're the first to come up with the idea of recycling and like to give one another pats on the back for such "original" thinking.

[Buzzard]

I wish this wasn't "funny because it's true."[/QUOTE]

Bob,
Hilarious!!

[showbizkid]

Interesting article in the WSJ this morning noting that after a year of pent-up demand and continuing artificially low interest rates, we seem to be ripe for another round of the runaway inflation cycle that plagued us in the mid-'70s. If you remember, back then, the cost of everything rose dramatically in a very short time - building supplies, petroleum, foodstuffs, household items - as demand outstripped supply and suppliers naturally priced according to scarcity, while wages remained essentially unchanged.

It was 50 years ago, but I remember it vividly. "Galloping stag-flation" is what the media called it. I hope we're not in for it again.

[8E45E]

Interesting article in the WSJ this morning noting that after a year of pent-up demand and continuing artificially low interest rates, we seem to be ripe for another round of the runaway inflation cycle that plagued us in the mid-'70s. If you remember, back then, the cost of everything rose dramatically in a very short time - building supplies, petroleum, foodstuffs, household items - as demand outstripped supply and suppliers naturally priced according to scarcity, while wages remained essentially unchanged.

Two items that I particularly remember that skyrocketed in price at that time was antifreeze, and sugar. Antifreeze shot up to something like $8 a gallon, and sugar the same for a one pound bag.

Craig

[Mark L]

What's frustrating is that even though the price of lumber is higher than it was, and they supply is less than it was, my wife and I can't find anyone interested in cutting our 100 acres of timber in north Georgia. We even contacted a local mill less than 8 miles from the property for a referral...crickets.

[Milaca]

What's frustrating is that even though the price of lumber is higher than it was, and they supply is less than it was, my wife and I can't find anyone interested in cutting our 100 acres of timber in north Georgia. We even contacted a local mill less than 8 miles from the property for a referral...crickets.

A recent article about the price of timber being cheap, despite the high price of lumber. In Louisiana as of March 31st, the price of timber is the lowest it has been since 2011!
Lumber Prices Soar, But Logs Are Still Dirt Cheap (yahoo.com)

[firestoper 25]

Labor shortage ? Here in Green Bay the constant tone is "I can not find ANYONE to do the work"

I need window work done (apprx. $1000 to $ 2000 materials then add the labor costs), I have contacted several local firms with acceptable references......I have been WAITING for three weeks for a RETURN call about my projects !!!

Good grief, I knew it was going to get worse...but really.

[rockne10]

... the spot market for their "product" changes from day to day and sometimes they store what they can for awhile to hold out for a higher price.

Our county refuse and recycling facility does the same, but the storage requirements are insane. The operation is huge; and much that could be recycled still goes to a landfill for sheer inability to sit on the raw materials.

We do have a company one county away that takes down old houses and salvages whatever they can to sell to contractors, whether it's classic lumber and trim, light fixtures, old wavy window glass, stained glass, fireplaces and mantels etc.
As well as a local "RESTORE" that accepts just about anything to re-market, and is associated with the local Habitat for Humanity.

Still hundreds of tons go to landfills.
My own employer puts out a shipping pallet (often brand new) to be crushed and hauled, simply because there is no room to accumulate them until it's worthwhile for someone else to pick them up.
I've taken a couple myself and turned them in to a dozen bird houses; but they sure don't come apart easily.

[BobPalma]

Valuable barn find!



Not the Porsche; the two 4X8 sheets of plywood! (OK: OSB) BP

[Hallabutt]

The average sawmill worker's wage is indicated to be $12.08/hr. and that's union scale. The maximum rate is just over $19/hr. This might seem like a lot to some reading this, but where I live it doesn't play very well. Even in rural areas where cost of living is less, I doubt that most workers would settle for those kinds of wages, given the the heavy dangerous work involved. The average scale for a lumberjack is about $42,000/yr. In a full employment economy, like the pre-pandemic economy, I doubt that either of these scales are very competitive.

[Andy R.]

For once, my earlier habit of buying an extra 4x8 for each project (I usually measure once, cut twice) is not a bad thing!
I have four sheets of perfect, knot-free panels stored in my "tinkering room" at my school. For once lumber is harder to come by than legal cannibis products, which both seem to have been used extensively in the construction of my 1978 house!

Then again, maybe George Washington was onto something with hemp: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4kKxY7KNyw