Because civilian consumers started to buy more than their historical usage based upon all the internet rumors. That lead to a shortage which has fed upon itself. Then the hoarders got involved. They consisted of panicked sportsmen, would-be profiteers, doomsday kooks, anarchists and an assortment of low information folks.
You can't reason with the kooks. They only believe what they want to believe, regardless of the indisputable facts staring them in the face.
Nobody has yet coined a name for the ammo conspiracy kooks, but they operate just like the man-caused global warming hucksters. Pay them no attention.
For the record: The American ammunition industry is currently producing rimfire ammunition at an annual rate of 9.3 BILLION rounds! The government purchases of rimfire ammo is close to none.
To amplify a little bit:
-Some pawn shops station employees at places like Academy and Walmart when bricks of .22 come in, and buy them all before John Q. Public has a chance at them. They buy these bricks for less than $30, then they turn around and sell them on gunbroker or in their shops for 3X what they paid.
-But the underlying problem seems to be that manufacturers have built a lot more .22 weapons lately, which have sold like hotcakes. This, of course, created a higher demand. The MP15-22 comes to mind.
Just a hint:
It wasn’t kooky to think the Left might try huge new restrictions on firearms and ammunition in the wake of Gabby Giffords, Aurora and Sandy Hook. In fact, they tried really hard, especially after that last. They were successful in some local jurisdictions, CT and NY in particular.
Just take your “kooky”, sit down, be quiet, and pay attention for a while.
Is your contention that anywhere close to 9.3 billion rounds were actually sold to consumers last year?
If so, who was selling it? Who was buying it? Seems like an awful lot of ammo to be sold in secret.
Sorry, but the answer has to be something different than...
"The reason there is no ammo for sale is because so many people are buying so much ammo."
That is kind of like Yogi Berra on why he quit going to a restaurant....
“Nobody goes there anymore because it’s too crowded.”