Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by bmelton 4459 days ago
An M-16 costs far more than $1,000, and is not available for purchase by the average citizen. Between the 1934 National Firearms Act, which prohibits the sale of fully automatic weapons to those who do not submit themselves to an extended (months' long) background check and pay an additional $200 tax stamp, and the 1986 National Firearms Act, which make all fully automatic firearms manufactured post-1986 non-transferrable to citizens means that the fair market value of an M16 is something closer to $15,000-$20,000, and that's for a used model that's at least 25 years old.

If those acts were repealed, I agree that the suggested MSRP for an M16 would be ~$1,000-$2,000.
2 comments
hga 4459 days ago
I don't believe you're showing you get the point (while making a lot of good tangential points). I seem to remember that government's cost for buying a M4 is something like $600 in quantity, but I forget if that was Colt's price before they lost the contract to FN like they lost the M16 contract (the Army buys the former, the Marines, who are still riflemen, the latter with its much longer barrel necessary to achieve bare minimum performance with normal military ammo).

So presumably in an arming the militia regime, our cost would be lower than the 1-2K you postulate, probably even lower due to massive quantity. With of course subsidies to help the poor ^_^.

(Beginning modified, for bmelton not surprisingly does get the point.)

link
bmelton 4459 days ago
Oh, I got the point, but historically, it went the other way around. It was the government's duty to provide firearms to the militia for those that didn't have them themselves.

That said, your sub-point is humorous, but overlooks that if modeled after the ACA, subsidized M16s would be available for near free, while non-subsidized M16s would be ~$4,000-$5,000, if you're in too high a tax bracket.

link
viggity 4459 days ago
I bought my AR-15 (DPMS, not a no-name) for $600 from walmart in 2011. You can build your own for ~$400-500 if you're willing to shop around.
link
bmelton 4459 days ago
An AR-15 is not an M16. That's actually the main thing I was attempting to clarify, though I seem to have meandered from the point.
link