22 ms·

Man sells 3D-printed firearms to a buyback program for $21,000

64 points by chelmzy 4y ago

mynameishere 4y ago
Typically two kinds of guns will be exchanged in such a program. Guns worth less than the offer, making it a kind of cash-for-clunkers boondoggle, and stolen guns. This guy came up with a third grift. So what?
- aeneasmackenzie 4y ago
  This has been done before, 3d printing just makes it easier. See the GB-22[0] aka "Gun Buyback 22" 0: https://serbu.com/gb-22-plans/ https://serbu.com/gb-22-plans/
rolph 4y ago
“And it ended with the guy and a lady from the budget office finally coming around with the 42 gift cards and counting them in front of me," said Kem. "$21,000 in $500 gift cards." Meanwhile, on Wednesday, a spokesperson at the Attorney General's Office released the following statement: “It’s shameful that this individual exploited a program that has successfully taken thousands of guns off the streets to protect our communities from gun violence. We have partnered with local police throughout the state to recover more than 3,500 guns, and one individual’s greedy behavior won’t tarnish our work to promote public safety. We have adjusted our policies to ensure that no one can exploit this program again for personal gain.”
- aeneasmackenzie 4y ago
  > We have adjusted our policies to ensure that no one can exploit this program again for personal gain. So any item that the NY AG gun buyback program will not purchase is thus legally not a gun in NY, right? If it's not worth buying to get it off the streets, they must be fine with it on the streets. This would include 3d printed AR lowers and FGC-9s at least. I think they will not implement this policy's consequences fairly.
  - viraptor 4y ago
    No, it does not mean that. Getting away with a loophole a few times and causing the rules to get adjusted to account for a grift does not change the law in general.
    - core-utility 4y ago
      "We're holding a gun buyback. But no, not that gun."
      - viraptor 4y ago
        Yes? That's how most rules work. They don't define everything precisely, we just agree that stupid behaviour and abuse attempts are worked around. This applies to pretty much everything.
  - rolph 4y ago
    this interesting as private manufacture firearm [PMF] can not be for sale or barter, they are to be for own personal use. it could be said [valid or not] these 3D PMF were manuactured with intent to sell, regardless of business status.
    - aksss 4y ago
      One of the main selling points of gun buyback programs is no-questions-asked amnesty.
    - MichaelCollins 4y ago
      It's legal to sell a gun you made yourself, if you didn't make it to sell it. E.g. I make a gun for myself, keep it for long enough to plausibly demonstrate that intent, then later get bored with it and sell it. That's legal. But if I do that a lot, it'll start to seem like I'm making them to sell them and without a license that becomes illegal.
      - rolph 4y ago
nivertech 4y ago
Cobra effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perverse_incentive#The_original_cobra_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perverse_incentive#The_origina...
- bryanlarsen 4y ago
  The difference is that this hole was exploited once and since been plugged.
  - Krisjohn 4y ago
    There is no difference, because you don't know how many other guns were 3D printed or milled for this buyback scheme that now won't be traded in. Maybe there will be an increase in ghost guns caused by the policy and its subsequent change.
- bertil 4y ago
  Not really: in that case, no one is dupe. It’s just a kid who is being blatantly churlish and wasting everyone else’s money.
  - recursive 4y ago
    We don't know if it's being wasted. He could be spending it on building orphanages.
  - nsxwolf 4y ago
    I would fault the officials that set up the gun buyback program with wasting everyone's money.
silexia 4y ago
Government regulations are not the answer.
- kennywinker 4y ago
  Yeah! Government regulations have never solved anything, ever! Except automobile safety, food safety, workplace safety, medical safety, and a few other things, but other than that they've NEVER solved ANYTHING!
  - cm42 4y ago
    Regulate me harder, daddy!
tekla 4y ago
Warms my heart to see 3D Printing to be this mature now https://www.wktv.com/news/local/nyag-changes-gun-buyback-rules-after-man-claims-he-made-21k-trading-3d-printed-guns/article_2fd70c72-400f-11ed-9676-efe7d23a3912.html https://www.wktv.com/news/local/nyag-changes-gun-buyback-rul... https://www.khou.com/article/news/local/houston-gun-buyback/285-0c82340e-a06e-4e7f-b00d-50d7bd64ec87 https://www.khou.com/article/news/local/houston-gun-buyback/...
- Kamq 4y ago
  Which brings to mind a question. What's the point of a gun buyback if they won't accept 3D printed guns? If it's to get guns off the street, it seems like you'd explicitly want to get cheap guns that are hard to trace (such as 3D printed guns). Or is this just turning into a ceremonial thing that we do because it made sense at one time?
  - kube-system 4y ago
    > What's the point of a gun buyback if they won't accept 3D printed guns? It takes guns off the street that criminals actually use? We'd probably decrease gun crime if we gave criminals garbage like this: https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/wktv.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/54/154f2b18-4010-11ed-9aae-ab0c908916c6/6335c1b2e7db7.image.jpg?resize=1175%2C665 https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/wktv.com/conten...
    - Kamq 4y ago
      Interesting hypothesis. It seems like we're planning on testing it.
      - kube-system 4y ago
        What's stopping criminals from printing these today and using them? The answer is that a Hi-Point is the same price and works way better.
cfeduke 4y ago
Based on the search results and how the copy is replicated across multiple "news" domains this story is probably a fake.
Steltek 4y ago
Alright, so he... 1. Spent time, electricity, and filament printing lowers and other components. He's a beginner using a $200 printer so the failure rate was probably pretty high. 2. He drove from NY to Utah 3. He haggled all day before getting paid out for only 42 of his 100 "guns" And he thinks he's making Utah's buyback program look foolish? This guy wasted a stupendous amount of time and money.
- tengbretson 4y ago
  He walked away with a payout nearly equal to the median individual yearly income in my area for a week or two of effort.
- chroma 4y ago
  The article is incorrect. He drove to Utica, NY, which took him six hours.[1] Both filament and electricity are incredibly cheap. His main costs were time, gas, and the risk of being pulled over on his way to the buyback.[2] Instead of printing full frames (which would take longer and use more filament), he printed a bunch of auto sears, which convert a semi-auto AR-15 to full auto. By the ATF's definition, auto sears are considered machine guns, so he got $350 per machine gun. Those auto sears are tiny. I doubt he spent more than a week of printer time on the whole endeavor. 1. https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570173184640520195 https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570173184640520195 2. https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570175250989715456 https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570175250989715456
- kennywinker 4y ago
  Let's napkin that - i've never 3d printed a gun, so I'm deliberately choosing super high estimates: $200 printer, $5 of filament each, 150 prints (high failure rate) 20 hours of printing each, 20*150 = 3000 hours of print time (125 days), 125 days of electricity for a 3d printer running at full capacity (idk but let's call it $500 to be safe), three day's drive to utah $100/night + gas (gasbuddy says ~$400) so total $1000 total: $2450 earnings: $21,000 profit less materials/energy costs: $18,550 hourly wage for working 8 hours a day on this for 125 days: $18.55 doesn't sound like he wasted any time or money, and I assume he worked much more like 2-4 hours a day on it which would mean it payed $37-75/hour.
kube-system 4y ago
> "Gun buybacks are a fantastic way of showing, number one, that your policies don't work, and, number 2, you're creating perverse demand. You're causing people to show up to these events, and, they don't actually reduce crime whatsoever." Of course, criminals aren't going to turn in their guns. Gun buybacks have always just been useful for their second order effects -- forgotten guns in attics being stolen, found by kids, etc. Yes, people take advantage of these events. There's not much of a way to filter participants by intent. People turn in broken or rusty junk that is not of danger anyway. Doing it with a junk plastic gun is not much different than doing the same with junk guns made from other materials. But the bottom line is I don't think anyone ever thought that the results of these events would be 1-for-1 removal of crime guns off the street.
- wyldfire 4y ago
  > I don't think anyone ever thought that the results of these events would be 1-for-1 removal of crime guns off the street. I don't think I would've guessed it but apparently firearm deaths exceed motor vehicle traffic deaths in the US. Score one for auto safety. But regarding "stolen, found by kids, etc." -- there's lots of accidental deaths and injuries from kids finding guns. So I think you're right -- that's exactly the kind of thing buybacks help reduce. Motor vehicle traffic deaths Number of deaths: 40,698 Deaths per 100,000 population: 12.4 All firearm deaths Number of deaths: 45,222 Deaths per 100,000 population: 13.7 Source: National Vital Statistics System – Mortality Data (2020) via CDC WONDER
  - thatswrong0 4y ago
    In the US, 60% of firearm deaths are from suicide. There are, on the other hand, ~430 accidental firearm deaths per year. Not saying reducing accidental deaths isn't a good thing, but in terms of efficacy, the dollar spent per reduced death, I feel like there might be better ways other than a buyback program.
    - core-utility 4y ago
      For anyone curious, 40% of 45,222 is 18,089
chroma 4y ago
The first person I know of to do this was at a gun buyback in Houston in August. He printed 63 single shot .22s and got $6,200 for it.[1] He then used that money to buy a bunch of guns for himself and his daughter. The guy who made $21,000 says he was inspired by the reward from the Houston buyback.[2] He drove six hours to Utica, not Utah[3] and along with three other guys, managed to get $45,000 from the Utica Police Department. One of those three bragged about getting $5,000 for a week of printing plastic and $7 worth of screws.[4] These people do this for two reasons. First, it's profitable (though that's likely to change as the buyback programs begin to exclude 3D printed guns). Second, it shows that it is incredibly cheap and easy to make firearms and illegal parts. Anyone with a $200 printer can build a safe and reliable semi-automatic handgun. It's even easier to build devices that convert a semi-auto firearm to full auto. Like the war on drugs, the policymakers have lost, they just don't know it yet. 1. https://twitter.com/CobraEconomics/status/1555413352259719169 https://twitter.com/CobraEconomics/status/155541335225971916... 2. https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570191067235946496 https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570191067235946496 3. https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570173184640520195 https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570173184640520195 4. https://twitter.com/ricky2a3d/status/1570306811588141061 https://twitter.com/ricky2a3d/status/1570306811588141061
- sschueller 4y ago
  "Anyone with a $200 printer can build a safe and reliable semi-automatic handgun." I highly doubt that. Maybe if you have most of it out of other parts but a fully printed handgun will fail after just a few shots and it isn't safe in any shape or form. I have 3d prints fall apart on their own if there are issues with the printer or material.
  - MichaelCollins 4y ago
    Anybody with $50 can build themselves a safe and reliable slamfire shotgun made out of metal. The hardware store employees will even cut the pipe for you. These can be sold to police buyback programs for a huge profit, or simply used as shotguns normally are used. The only way to stop this is to restrict the availability of ammunition, which is feasible in some countries but not America.
BonoboIO 4y ago
Well, that’s not a nice thing to do, but I m amazed by his ingenuity.
joshcryer 4y ago
The Iron Pipeline is responsible for the vast majority of guns used in crimes in NY, which NY has virtually no power over. Guys going out of state and buying guns in private straw purchases to resell or trade on the market back in NY. This guy only shows how easily transporting guns across state lines is. The half solution has always been to regulate the private sell of guns (you have to do a background check in most states to buy a gun but not in a private sale) but even that is a half measure because if you did it private gun ownership "thefts" would skyrocket.
zerocrates 4y ago
Man, I had no idea people were so hostile to gun buybacks.
- cm42 4y ago
  Far from hostile, he seems like their biggest fan and number one contributor.
- jakebasile 4y ago
  The very term is a lie. These guns were almost surely never owned by the government, so it is not buying anything back. Guns do not belong to the government by default. The word has also been used to describe involuntary confiscation of weapons, which many people who value their rights would oppose in the strongest terms. In addition, guns have value to people for more than functionality. There's endless stories of people selling "back" their grandpa's WW2 take back piece that would be worth thousands of dollars to the right collector and would be restored and enjoyed for decades, only for a police officer to at best "lose" it in transport or more likely send it to be melted down for scrap so someone could get a $50 gift card and local police can post to Twitter about how another dangerous war relic is off the streets.
  - kennywinker 4y ago
    Buyback as in you bought it from somewhere, and the government buys it from you. Buyback doesn't, to me anyway, imply that the government sold it to you in the first place.
    - jakebasile 4y ago
      Your notion of the word doesn't match the definition : NOUN buyback (noun) the buying back of goods by the original seller. the buying back by a company of its own shares. a form of borrowing in which shares or bonds are sold with an agreement to repurchase them at a later date: "a share buy-back" synonyms: retrieve · regain · recover · get back · reclaim · repossess
zanethomas 4y ago
roflmao
f1shy 4y ago
This remembers me to the story of the UK trying to eliminate cobras in India. They offered some money in exchange for a dead cobra. It turned out that the locals started to farm cobras to get the bounty. After the government understood it was not working, they stoped the program. All people farming cobras left them in the wild... at the end the amount of cobras was a multiple as the beginning... It is difficult to make good public policies.

64 points by chelmzy 4y ago

Typically two kinds of guns will be exchanged in such a program. Guns worth less than the offer, making it a kind of cash-for-clunkers boondoggle, and stolen guns. This guy came up with a third grift. So what?

aeneasmackenzie 4y ago
This has been done before, 3d printing just makes it easier. See the GB-22[0] aka "Gun Buyback 22" 0: https://serbu.com/gb-22-plans/ https://serbu.com/gb-22-plans/

rolph 4y ago

“And it ended with the guy and a lady from the budget office finally coming around with the 42 gift cards and counting them in front of me," said Kem. "$21,000 in $500 gift cards." Meanwhile, on Wednesday, a spokesperson at the Attorney General's Office released the following statement: “It’s shameful that this individual exploited a program that has successfully taken thousands of guns off the streets to protect our communities from gun violence. We have partnered with local police throughout the state to recover more than 3,500 guns, and one individual’s greedy behavior won’t tarnish our work to promote public safety. We have adjusted our policies to ensure that no one can exploit this program again for personal gain.”

aeneasmackenzie 4y ago
> We have adjusted our policies to ensure that no one can exploit this program again for personal gain. So any item that the NY AG gun buyback program will not purchase is thus legally not a gun in NY, right? If it's not worth buying to get it off the streets, they must be fine with it on the streets. This would include 3d printed AR lowers and FGC-9s at least. I think they will not implement this policy's consequences fairly.
- viraptor 4y ago
  No, it does not mean that. Getting away with a loophole a few times and causing the rules to get adjusted to account for a grift does not change the law in general.
  - core-utility 4y ago
    "We're holding a gun buyback. But no, not that gun."
    - viraptor 4y ago
      Yes? That's how most rules work. They don't define everything precisely, we just agree that stupid behaviour and abuse attempts are worked around. This applies to pretty much everything.
- rolph 4y ago
  this interesting as private manufacture firearm [PMF] can not be for sale or barter, they are to be for own personal use. it could be said [valid or not] these 3D PMF were manuactured with intent to sell, regardless of business status.
  - aksss 4y ago
    One of the main selling points of gun buyback programs is no-questions-asked amnesty.
  - MichaelCollins 4y ago
    It's legal to sell a gun you made yourself, if you didn't make it to sell it. E.g. I make a gun for myself, keep it for long enough to plausibly demonstrate that intent, then later get bored with it and sell it. That's legal. But if I do that a lot, it'll start to seem like I'm making them to sell them and without a license that becomes illegal.
    - rolph 4y ago

nivertech 4y ago

Cobra effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perverse_incentive#The_original_cobra_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perverse_incentive#The_origina...

bryanlarsen 4y ago
The difference is that this hole was exploited once and since been plugged.
- Krisjohn 4y ago
  There is no difference, because you don't know how many other guns were 3D printed or milled for this buyback scheme that now won't be traded in. Maybe there will be an increase in ghost guns caused by the policy and its subsequent change.
bertil 4y ago
Not really: in that case, no one is dupe. It’s just a kid who is being blatantly churlish and wasting everyone else’s money.
- recursive 4y ago
  We don't know if it's being wasted. He could be spending it on building orphanages.
- nsxwolf 4y ago
  I would fault the officials that set up the gun buyback program with wasting everyone's money.

silexia 4y ago

Government regulations are not the answer.

kennywinker 4y ago
Yeah! Government regulations have never solved anything, ever! Except automobile safety, food safety, workplace safety, medical safety, and a few other things, but other than that they've NEVER solved ANYTHING!
- cm42 4y ago
  Regulate me harder, daddy!

tekla 4y ago

Warms my heart to see 3D Printing to be this mature now https://www.wktv.com/news/local/nyag-changes-gun-buyback-rules-after-man-claims-he-made-21k-trading-3d-printed-guns/article_2fd70c72-400f-11ed-9676-efe7d23a3912.html https://www.wktv.com/news/local/nyag-changes-gun-buyback-rul... https://www.khou.com/article/news/local/houston-gun-buyback/285-0c82340e-a06e-4e7f-b00d-50d7bd64ec87 https://www.khou.com/article/news/local/houston-gun-buyback/...

Kamq 4y ago
Which brings to mind a question. What's the point of a gun buyback if they won't accept 3D printed guns? If it's to get guns off the street, it seems like you'd explicitly want to get cheap guns that are hard to trace (such as 3D printed guns). Or is this just turning into a ceremonial thing that we do because it made sense at one time?
- kube-system 4y ago
  > What's the point of a gun buyback if they won't accept 3D printed guns? It takes guns off the street that criminals actually use? We'd probably decrease gun crime if we gave criminals garbage like this: https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/wktv.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/54/154f2b18-4010-11ed-9aae-ab0c908916c6/6335c1b2e7db7.image.jpg?resize=1175%2C665 https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/wktv.com/conten...
  - Kamq 4y ago
    Interesting hypothesis. It seems like we're planning on testing it.
    - kube-system 4y ago
      What's stopping criminals from printing these today and using them? The answer is that a Hi-Point is the same price and works way better.

cfeduke 4y ago

Based on the search results and how the copy is replicated across multiple "news" domains this story is probably a fake.

Steltek 4y ago

Alright, so he... 1. Spent time, electricity, and filament printing lowers and other components. He's a beginner using a $200 printer so the failure rate was probably pretty high. 2. He drove from NY to Utah 3. He haggled all day before getting paid out for only 42 of his 100 "guns" And he thinks he's making Utah's buyback program look foolish? This guy wasted a stupendous amount of time and money.

tengbretson 4y ago
He walked away with a payout nearly equal to the median individual yearly income in my area for a week or two of effort.
chroma 4y ago
The article is incorrect. He drove to Utica, NY, which took him six hours.[1] Both filament and electricity are incredibly cheap. His main costs were time, gas, and the risk of being pulled over on his way to the buyback.[2] Instead of printing full frames (which would take longer and use more filament), he printed a bunch of auto sears, which convert a semi-auto AR-15 to full auto. By the ATF's definition, auto sears are considered machine guns, so he got $350 per machine gun. Those auto sears are tiny. I doubt he spent more than a week of printer time on the whole endeavor. 1. https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570173184640520195 https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570173184640520195 2. https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570175250989715456 https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570175250989715456
kennywinker 4y ago
Let's napkin that - i've never 3d printed a gun, so I'm deliberately choosing super high estimates: $200 printer, $5 of filament each, 150 prints (high failure rate) 20 hours of printing each, 20*150 = 3000 hours of print time (125 days), 125 days of electricity for a 3d printer running at full capacity (idk but let's call it $500 to be safe), three day's drive to utah $100/night + gas (gasbuddy says ~$400) so total $1000 total: $2450 earnings: $21,000 profit less materials/energy costs: $18,550 hourly wage for working 8 hours a day on this for 125 days: $18.55 doesn't sound like he wasted any time or money, and I assume he worked much more like 2-4 hours a day on it which would mean it payed $37-75/hour.

kube-system 4y ago

> "Gun buybacks are a fantastic way of showing, number one, that your policies don't work, and, number 2, you're creating perverse demand. You're causing people to show up to these events, and, they don't actually reduce crime whatsoever." Of course, criminals aren't going to turn in their guns. Gun buybacks have always just been useful for their second order effects -- forgotten guns in attics being stolen, found by kids, etc. Yes, people take advantage of these events. There's not much of a way to filter participants by intent. People turn in broken or rusty junk that is not of danger anyway. Doing it with a junk plastic gun is not much different than doing the same with junk guns made from other materials. But the bottom line is I don't think anyone ever thought that the results of these events would be 1-for-1 removal of crime guns off the street.

wyldfire 4y ago
> I don't think anyone ever thought that the results of these events would be 1-for-1 removal of crime guns off the street. I don't think I would've guessed it but apparently firearm deaths exceed motor vehicle traffic deaths in the US. Score one for auto safety. But regarding "stolen, found by kids, etc." -- there's lots of accidental deaths and injuries from kids finding guns. So I think you're right -- that's exactly the kind of thing buybacks help reduce. Motor vehicle traffic deaths Number of deaths: 40,698 Deaths per 100,000 population: 12.4 All firearm deaths Number of deaths: 45,222 Deaths per 100,000 population: 13.7 Source: National Vital Statistics System – Mortality Data (2020) via CDC WONDER
- thatswrong0 4y ago
  In the US, 60% of firearm deaths are from suicide. There are, on the other hand, ~430 accidental firearm deaths per year. Not saying reducing accidental deaths isn't a good thing, but in terms of efficacy, the dollar spent per reduced death, I feel like there might be better ways other than a buyback program.
  - core-utility 4y ago
    For anyone curious, 40% of 45,222 is 18,089

chroma 4y ago

The first person I know of to do this was at a gun buyback in Houston in August. He printed 63 single shot .22s and got $6,200 for it.[1] He then used that money to buy a bunch of guns for himself and his daughter. The guy who made $21,000 says he was inspired by the reward from the Houston buyback.[2] He drove six hours to Utica, not Utah[3] and along with three other guys, managed to get $45,000 from the Utica Police Department. One of those three bragged about getting $5,000 for a week of printing plastic and $7 worth of screws.[4] These people do this for two reasons. First, it's profitable (though that's likely to change as the buyback programs begin to exclude 3D printed guns). Second, it shows that it is incredibly cheap and easy to make firearms and illegal parts. Anyone with a $200 printer can build a safe and reliable semi-automatic handgun. It's even easier to build devices that convert a semi-auto firearm to full auto. Like the war on drugs, the policymakers have lost, they just don't know it yet. 1. https://twitter.com/CobraEconomics/status/1555413352259719169 https://twitter.com/CobraEconomics/status/155541335225971916... 2. https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570191067235946496 https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570191067235946496 3. https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570173184640520195 https://twitter.com/kem_regik/status/1570173184640520195 4. https://twitter.com/ricky2a3d/status/1570306811588141061 https://twitter.com/ricky2a3d/status/1570306811588141061

sschueller 4y ago
"Anyone with a $200 printer can build a safe and reliable semi-automatic handgun." I highly doubt that. Maybe if you have most of it out of other parts but a fully printed handgun will fail after just a few shots and it isn't safe in any shape or form. I have 3d prints fall apart on their own if there are issues with the printer or material.
- MichaelCollins 4y ago
  Anybody with $50 can build themselves a safe and reliable slamfire shotgun made out of metal. The hardware store employees will even cut the pipe for you. These can be sold to police buyback programs for a huge profit, or simply used as shotguns normally are used. The only way to stop this is to restrict the availability of ammunition, which is feasible in some countries but not America.

BonoboIO 4y ago

Well, that’s not a nice thing to do, but I m amazed by his ingenuity.

joshcryer 4y ago

The Iron Pipeline is responsible for the vast majority of guns used in crimes in NY, which NY has virtually no power over. Guys going out of state and buying guns in private straw purchases to resell or trade on the market back in NY. This guy only shows how easily transporting guns across state lines is. The half solution has always been to regulate the private sell of guns (you have to do a background check in most states to buy a gun but not in a private sale) but even that is a half measure because if you did it private gun ownership "thefts" would skyrocket.

zerocrates 4y ago

Man, I had no idea people were so hostile to gun buybacks.

cm42 4y ago
Far from hostile, he seems like their biggest fan and number one contributor.
jakebasile 4y ago
The very term is a lie. These guns were almost surely never owned by the government, so it is not buying anything back. Guns do not belong to the government by default. The word has also been used to describe involuntary confiscation of weapons, which many people who value their rights would oppose in the strongest terms. In addition, guns have value to people for more than functionality. There's endless stories of people selling "back" their grandpa's WW2 take back piece that would be worth thousands of dollars to the right collector and would be restored and enjoyed for decades, only for a police officer to at best "lose" it in transport or more likely send it to be melted down for scrap so someone could get a $50 gift card and local police can post to Twitter about how another dangerous war relic is off the streets.
- kennywinker 4y ago
  Buyback as in you bought it from somewhere, and the government buys it from you. Buyback doesn't, to me anyway, imply that the government sold it to you in the first place.
  - jakebasile 4y ago
    Your notion of the word doesn't match the definition : NOUN buyback (noun) the buying back of goods by the original seller. the buying back by a company of its own shares. a form of borrowing in which shares or bonds are sold with an agreement to repurchase them at a later date: "a share buy-back" synonyms: retrieve · regain · recover · get back · reclaim · repossess

zanethomas 4y ago

roflmao

f1shy 4y ago

This remembers me to the story of the UK trying to eliminate cobras in India. They offered some money in exchange for a dead cobra. It turned out that the locals started to farm cobras to get the bounty. After the government understood it was not working, they stoped the program. All people farming cobras left them in the wild... at the end the amount of cobras was a multiple as the beginning... It is difficult to make good public policies.