John, Now that the lumber bubble has burst, will you help us branch out?

[link removed]

The futures price of lumber was $303.40 per thousand board feet in March 2020. In May 2021, it reached $1,607.50 ([link removed]) .

This "wooden inflation" inspired memes, like this...
But now, the bubble has burst. Prices have been in "free fall" even though they haven't returned to their original levels. As I write this, they're at $797 ([link removed]) .

And we know why this happened. It's a government-sponsored crisis. National Public Radio reports...
* Demand for new home framing lumber surged.
* Homeowners on lockdown did more woodworking or resurrected projects that had been on hold.
* Sawmills struggled to keep up as their workers were forced to stay home.

Greater demand; less supply. A recipe for higher prices, right?

Not so fast!

It's also the case that politicians paid people to stay home and not work. Then, on top of that, they passed out stimulus checks. To the recipients, this felt like wealth, so demand was dramatically increased even further. Lumber more than quintupled in cost.

Do you know what else increased in cost?

Advertising. In the Annual Report ([link removed]) by the Advocates for Self-Government, we reported successful advertising rates of...
* 16c per quiz completion (Facebook)
* 9c per quiz completion (Google)

In fact, we budgeted for this. Then, we set our Wildly Important Goal for 2021...

One Million Quiz Completions!

But the price of advertising dramatically increased. It wasn't as bad as lumber, but it was enough that I turned down our reach in April. Then, I turned it off completely in May.

As we near the midpoint of the year, we have only 298,000 quiz completions.

Clearly, at this rate, we’re not going to make the One Million goal.

Everything we do at The Advocates starts with a quiz, either our...

World's Smallest Political Quiz ([link removed])

-OR-

Single Issue Surveys ([link removed])

In each case, people reflect upon and discover their political values, one plank at a time.

Most of them are going on to participate in our Human Respect Test. Here, they're discovering they don't want the government using its power to coerce (to tax, to dictate, to oppress, to bomb) at rates of nearly 80%!

If I had a pile of lumber and plywood, I'd sell it to buy more advertising. I'd restart our advertising. Indeed, we need to accelerate to achieve our million quiz goal.

This is doable. Last year, we did 605,000 tests.

But I don't have wood to sell.

Instead, I must turn to you.

There are two ways to give…

Sustaining Members provide automated monthly pledges. They give us stability and the ability to plan ahead.
Become a Sustaining Member ([link removed])

One-time Donors give us a surge of support that we can use right now to get started.
Become a One-Time Donor ([link removed])

Note: When you click those links, you’ll see donor impact bullets. Those statements are general. But your support, today, is going (AND PLEASE DON'T MISS THIS) entirely to advertising outreach. You see…

Our overhead is funded. We just don't want to waste any more of the dwindling time we have left to reach "One Million in '21."

Thank you for your support,
[link removed]


Mike Sertic
President
Advocates for Self-Government
[email protected]

P.S. Another way to get our numbers up and achieve our mission is for you to invite friends and family to take our quizzes...

World's Smallest Political Quiz ([link removed])
Single Issue Surveys ([link removed])

Thank you for sharing and supporting this outreach!

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