Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn celebrated the results of her 13th gun-buyback program last weekend. This one was conducted in an empty parking lot in Torrance and, using an estimated $20,000 in taxpayer-funded gift cards, brought in 256 firearms. Some of them were rusty, inoperable firearms that their owners were happy to offload onto LA taxpayers.
She rejoiced:
Today in closets and bedrooms across L.A. County, there are 2,000 fewer guns that can be found by a child, accidentally discharged, or stolen and used to kill in a crime. That makes all of the work we’ve done to bring these buybacks to our residents worth it.
There is absolutely no evidence of any kind that such publicity stunts have any impact whatsoever on gun violence, and precious little on suicides.
Her stunts have been going on since early 2022, and have cost L.A. taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars. They brought in a total of 2,052 guns. But do these buybacks really do any good?
In December 2022, the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) published the results of a study on just that question: Do gun buybacks have any measurable impact on gun violence? After all, that’s the bill of goods sold to taxpayers who are funding the charade. […]
— Read More: thenewamerican.com
