Lincoln Electric Reports Record 2005 Results

The majority of this article describes the percentages of how much Lincoln Electric imporved through 2005. For those of you who don't know what Lincoln Electric is, it is a world's leading manufacturer of arc-welders. I want to use them as an example of a supply and demand graph to explain what might have caused their profits to increase dramatically.

Lincoln Electric is the leader in technology and design of the welders. It is possible that they created a new design or technology that made manufacturing welders more efficient and less costly. This situation would cause the supply curve to increase to the right, thus creating more supply. There was also an increase in the number of companies and people needing welders caused by natural disasters, specifically the areas hit by Hurricane Katrina. This increase could have caused a shift of the demand curve to the right. These two situations combined would create an increase in quantity and most likely an increase in price, though price is indeterminable; thus creating a situation where Lincoln Electric earns record profits in 2005.