[phobosanomaly]

Through buyback programs and legal penalties for possession, the amount of weapons in meaningful circulation would likely decrease substantially over a period of years.

As that process occurred, the value of the weapons would spike as scarcity took hold, and tactically-useful firearms (e.g. semi-auto) would become expensive on the black market. This would mean that criminals would need to be far more judicious with how they carried and used them.

It is very plausible that this scarcity effect would lead to a meaningful reduction in the possession and use of firearms by low-level street criminals, which would also by extension lead to a reduction in levels of firearms-related homicide, assault, and intimidation.

A low-level narcotics broker is less likely to carry around a Glock that costs $10,000 (which they have to dump off of a bridge or in a storm drain every time it's used in a homicide), than they are to carry around a black-market stolen Glock that cost $600.

[zepto]

> As that process occurred, the value of the weapons would spike as scarcity took hold

This seems implausible. The number of guns used in crime is in the tens of thousands each year.

The number of guns sold this year was more than 20,000,000.

The number in circulation is greater than 400,000,000.

Even in Australia compliance with gun buybacks wasn’t much more than 50%, and they didn’t have a second amendment.

The idea that Guns will become scarce in the US any time soon is simply unrealistic.

As for the 10,000 glock, that situation is also just a fantasy.

In London criminals can simply rent guns, fairy cheaply but with a high deposit. They only discard them if they fire them in a crime, otherwise they return them and get their deposit back.

This way, even just one gun can be used by hundreds of criminals at minimal expense, and with little risk of being caught possessing an illegal weapon.

[phobosanomaly]

One thing is, you have to subtract bolt guns, and bolt gun calibers from circulating firearm and ammunition totals. That should cut the number down quite significantly.

The guns wouldn't instantaneously disappear overnight in this scenario. It would take 10-20 years to see a sizeable impact.

I have an interesting quote related to the UK and gun laws:

Gun deaths remain extremely rare in Britain, and very few people, even police officers, carry firearms. But the growing presence of American weapons on the streets, which has not previously been widely reported, comes as serious violent crime, like murders and stabbings, has risen sharply.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/12/world/europe/handguns-smu...

So, hey, U.S. firearms restrictions might have some very positive outcomes for the U.K. (and Mexico as well).

I'd love if you could share an article about that firearms rental operation, how prevalent those weapons actually are, and if they're coming in from the United States.

[laverya]

I could theoretically manufacture a pistol-caliber carbine myself for under $1000, including the 3d-printer. As in, from bar stock + hydraulic pipe + DC current source + 3d printed components. Look up the FGC-9 - it's pretty impressive.

That's with current tech, and I don't think the tech of 20 years from now is going to be worse. If anything, 3d printing will be even better.

Now, that FGC-9 isn't nearly as concealable as a standard Glock. But I'm sure there's ongoing efforts to make a home-manufacturable semiauto pistol, too.

The more interesting thing to manufacture yourself is ammunition - smokeless powders are rather flammable, primers take that and scale it to 11 with a side of toxicity, and case manufacture has a lot lower tolerances than you'd think. (Bullets are comparatively easy, if you have a source of lead stock and can make a mold) But the number of guns in circulation in the US pales in comparison to the amount of ammunition stockpiled - estimates generally put annual sales at 8 to 10 BILLION rounds of ammunition. A lot of that is fired each year, but that's still a hell of a stockpile to go through first.

[phobosanomaly]

I think you raise a really interesting point with this, and I want to offer a counterexample that I managed to come up with.

So, yes you can make an FGC-9 in your garage. Fair enough.

But are the barriers to manufacturing one in the garage sufficient to significantly reduce proliferation?

So, my example is the widespread absence of fully-automatic weapons in U.S. crime. Any schmuck with a lathe and a milling machine in the garage can crank out fully-automatic sub guns like it's Christmas in Sarajevo in 1993. But nobody does. You only very rarely hear about full-auto being used in the commission of crimes. Why? Perhaps the illegality, expense, and manufacturing hurdles (however small they might be) are just good enough to prevent meaningful proliferation in the way we see with semi-autos today.

The ammo thing is an interesting point too. I would think one of the biggest hurdles would be to homebrew ammo that was clean-burning enough not to immediately jam something like an FGC-9 in small calibers. I looked into cartridge case manufacturing and I guess there's a brass drawing process or something. I wonder how difficult it would be to base a design around CNC machined cartridge cases instead?