Chicago buyback guns

Gun buyback programs (GBPs), which use public funds to purchase civilians’ privately-owned firearms, aim to reduce gun violence. However, little is known about their effects on firearm-related crime or deaths. Using data from the National Incident Based Reporting System, we find no evidence that GBPs reduce gun crime.

Given our estimated null findings, with 95 percent confidence, we can rule out decreases in firearm-related crime of greater than 1.3 percent during the year following a buyback. Using data from the National Vital Statistics System, we also find no evidence that GBPs reduce suicides or homicides where a firearm was involved.

— National Bureau of Economic Research in Have U.S. Gun Buyback Programs Misfired?

31 COMMENTS

  1. You think anyone who has spent the last 14 months screeching about “following the science” will listen to this?

    • They are following “political science”. Lysenko’s biological theories are a prime example of “political science”.

    • It’s not “Follow the science” but rather…

      “Follow the scientist that I agree with and ignore the scientist that I dis-agree with”

    • Everyone needs to just HUSH, until I get clear of 2 dangerous guns I’ve been hanging on to for 25 years or so waiting for a buyback. Of COURSE they accomplish nothing, other than lightening the wallets of those who support them. So what?

  2. Gun buybacks don’t work (the genteel approach)…thus, we have the ever increasingly draconian legislative restrictions, impositions to include: mandatory licensing requirements, mandatory storage, mandatory turn-ins, mandatory this and mandatory that, and, ultimately, the threat of door-to-door confiscation registration…(the less genteel approach).

    From Wiki: Death by a thousand cuts (psychology), the way a major negative change which happens slowly in many unnoticed increments is not perceived as objectionable.

  3. Again? Must be the hundredth time “buybacks” have been found to be useless.
    It’s not like they’ll ever stop doing them.
    Just like the mask wearing.
    Zealots gonna zealot and virtue must be signaled.

    • And criminals gonna criminal,

      And laws that purport to reduce crime by putting criminals on the honor system gonna fail.

  4. Firearm “buyback” events (a misnomer since government never owned the subject firearms in the first place) are wildly successful in the most important sense to the people who advocate/operate them: “buyback” events FEEL GOOD and CONTRIBUTE TO A SENSE OF UNITY.

    Never, ever forget that principle: with respect to Far-Left/Progressives, their overriding priorities are feeling good and advancing unity/solidarity.

    And on the unity/solidarity front, Far Left/Progressives are quite comfortable with any and all coercive measures–up to and including imprisonment and even execution–if necessary to achieve unity/solidarity.

    • For reference it is helpful to understand the unity/solidarity dynamic which dominates Far Left/Progressive minds. As is almost always the case with human beings, there is an underlying cause which is harmless and potentially even quite beneficial. Unfortunately, given the deeply flawed nature of many/most human beings, they pervert that underlying cause which was harmless or even beneficial into something destructive.

      The underlying cause is two-fold:

      1) People want to be an integral part of something much larger, much more important, and much more timeless than themselves. For those of you who believe in God, it is the “God-shaped hole in our minds/souls”. For the those of you who do not believe in God, I am not aware of any alternate rational/plausible/naturalistic explanation.

      2) People inherently recognize the huge survival benefit of “strength in numbers” and fervently seek that strength.

      As I mentioned, many/most people are deeply flawed and pervert those two human characteristics. Some people seek to fill their “God-shaped hole in their mind/soul” themselves, either leading or being a member of some giant collective. Others exploit that need which the masses have and appoint themselves as an alternate “god”–which of course requires unwavering allegiance to his/her own selfish goals.

      That second dynamic is pretty obvious. Hordes of people decide that being a card-carrying member of the collective is valuable enough that they surrender their rights to join. And, once again, corrupt people exploit that dynamic and demand that people give up their rights to join the collective–which ultimately is primarily for the benefit of the person/people ruling the collective rather than for the benefit of the members of the collective.

      The sooner that you understand and embrace the relatively simple truth that I just laid out here, the better.

      • I look at it this way :

        The more of private groups like Bloomberg, et.all, that sink their private money into those things, the less they will have to use against us.

        Using public money ought to be a criminal act with mandatory federal prison time…

    • Yep, in order for them to feel like they are over the rainbow in technicolor unicorn land they will happily torture, rob, or murder you. The American Leftists are not any different from Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, or Hitler who they claim to hate, if you’re the square peg they will carve parts off you till you fit their round hole; your pain and blood loss are justified because they see you as evil because you stand in their way.

  5. Yeah, I’m waiting for the next one around here to cash in on the 80 % lower I got from a buddy after he effed it up with a mislocated hole…. I will love getting it on video when a St. Paul cop says ” that’s not a firearm, sir”

    • Forcing government to pay out on splitting hairs………well as a government employee you are technically correct and thus the best kind of correct so pass go and collect 200. Still tickled pink the last buyback our region did was mostly jennings, jiminezes, and home depot slammers.

    • Yep, save that video file to donate to the cause whenever the first lawsuit is filed if the proposed regulation changes take effect.

  6. Gun buybacks were designed to get the gun that grandpa owned back in the 30 or 40s out of the hands of family members that do not have guns in their life. This might keep a youngster(hotheaded or curious) that has no training from grabbing it and using it in a anti social manner.
    This was a good idea by well meaning people that really did not work. Families keep things like this, because they were important to grandpa, they were very expensive from that earlier time, they are a family symbol and in the case of handguns, they are small enough to store in a memorabilia drawer or trunk.
    Many families have a handgun in it’s original box, with some ammo for it from the same era in it’s original box in a drawer somewhere. I have bought a couple of them. While semi autos might need a cleaning and some new springs, these are otherwise ready to be fired. Some have had no rounds fired and some have had very few rounds fired through them. I am sure that there are millions of heirloom firearms out there. If you do have one that you do not want, take it to someone who sells guns – you might not get more money for it, but you will make a collector happy and he has plenty of guns, so that one has very small chance of being misused.

  7. Just perused my local estate sale page…incredible sale in Hobart,IN today & Saturday with a boatload
    of very nice guns,ammo & primers! See:Chicago Estate Sales if you can. I have to somewhere else😞

    • Too funny… a buddy and me were going to go there today (the Smalley sale, right?). Luckily for my cash stash, something else came up. Oh well, I probably would have been bidding against some others here anyway

      • Yep! I can’t compete especially from IL. Even my new Indiana resident buddy isn’t going. Diana Cook isn’t the brightest bulb but it’ll be jammed. It’s not on auction…

  8. Rents two weeks overdue, babies need milk, I’m out of beer .
    I told my brother, you either sale that gunm or use it , start suppoting our kids I can’t do it by myself.

      • With the ‘gunm’ he used, I’d say it’s more likely the Marsupial One.

        Welcome back, JWM.

        Yeah, the new layout *sucks*. We’ll all suffer together, and my little pony, er, troll is still suffering the most, as I kick him square in the teeth as often as I can… 😉

  9. Klamath Falls Herald and News: Thursday, May 7th, 2020/Letters To The Editor
    LETTER TO THE EDITOR
    Gun control

    “Injustice everywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
    -Martin Luther King

    As a local outspoken Second Amendment activist and advocate of the .38 caliber revolver (.38 Special and .357 Magnum) for the honest law abiding citizen I was naturally provoked to resistance against “Supreme Court ducks a Second Amendment issue-for now”: Herald and News: Thursday, April 30, 2020.

    This anti-gun commentary pontificated elitist uppity “LBJ/KGB” style socialist class warfare! Of course, don’t expect moral and intellectually honesty from an anti-gun journalist via the L.A. Times. Jeffrey Snyder’s “A Nation Of Cowards: The Public Interest Quarterly Fall 1993 states under The Unarmed Life, “The liberal elite (actually treasonous socialists!) know that they are philosopher-kings. They know that the people simply cannot be trusted; that they are incapable of just and fair self-government; that left to their own devices, their society will be racist, sexist, homophobic, and inequitable – and the liberal elite know how to fix things. They are going to help us live the good and just life, even if they have to lie to us and force us to do it. And they detest those who stand in their way.

    The private ownership of firearms is a rebuke to this Utopian zeal. To own firearms is to affirm that freedom and liberty are not gifts from the state. It is to reserve final judgment about whether the state is encroaching on freedom and liberty, to stand ready to defend that freedom with more than mere words, and to stand outside the state’s totalitarian reach”.

    “Gun Control Is Not About Public Safety” by Nicohlas T. Loux, PhD is linked for further scrutiny on this civil rights/human rights issue via http://www.jpfo.org/pdf03/sentine-19-web.pdf.” Finally my own January 2009 Herald and News letter: “Gun rights protect all races, not just a few” remains archived in this newspaper.

    James A. Farmer, Merrill
    Merrill, Oregon in Klamath County
    Long Live The State of Jefferson!

    These anti-gun “turn in guns for cash scams” are predicated upon political deceit, class warfare, and for promoting disarmed/unarmed victimhood! They have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with reducing violent crime, protection of the innocent (including women and children), and making our communities safer! No the don’t. Any merchants who sponsor something as vile, odious, and deceitful like this rightly deserve to be boycotted, picketed, and ran out of business! Also……I label this racket as the “surrender, submit, and bend over bare assed to the brute with the bullwhip!” Those who turn their swords into plowshares, will share with those who don’t.

  10. There’s got to be someone on the receiving end that’s eyeballin’ the flow to see if one of Gramps has been turned in and is actually a great keeper…..YA TINK???!!!???!!!🤣😉🤩😆🤐😎

  11. I’m all for gun buybacks that use private Leftist money that pays me and others hundreds of dollars for jammomatic rust bucket pistols.

    Use the dough to buy new functional guns.

  12. I’d like to propose a federal law:

    Anyone who, upon inheriting valuable firearms that could be sold to the private sector to realize a gain of $1,000.00 or more, who gives said firearms to a local/city/state “buyback” campaign loses their Medicare coverage and Social Security survivor benefits at the rate of one year for each $1K valuation of inherited firearms.

    • @DG

      I usually agree with you almost 100%…but, do we really want another Federal firearm law on the books that will be selectively enforced at ATF’s whim?

      I offer, instead, an Economic Reality Act wherein seized firearms shall not be destroyed until their historic and current values are properly appraised and that all firearms meeting the minimum criteria be salvaged and sold at open auction to cover State budget deficits…waste not, want not. Officers of the Court who intentionally circumvent the ERA will forfeit their positions immediately and be held personally liable for any lost revenues to the State.

      G’nite

    • Good to see DG back, was getting worried about potential health issues…

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