America's Gun Violence

mcgruff10 said:

We have gun registration here in New Jersey and believe it or not, we still have crimes. 

CM189191 said:

mace1229 said:

I think better registration is a good place to start.
What would gun insurance do?

It acknowledges the actual societal cost of gun ownership:

The real problem with gun ownership is that they involve "externalities," which is economist-speak for the fact that your gun may be used to hurt others. For instance, when Nancy Lanza purchased her Bushmaster AR-15, she probably weighed the benefits of owning the gun — the joy of ownership — with the price (about $800). But it's unlikely she considered the loss, pain and grief that might follow if it were used by her son to kill 26 innocents. When people fail to consider the broader social costs of choices like buying a gun, they're more likely to do them, and society suffers.

You would need it to buy a gun, and the policy would have to include liability coverage in case that gun injures someone. If a gun owner has no accidents, his premiums go down. Someone who wants to "open carry" his weapon would pay more than someone who keeps it locked at home. Assault weapons would be more expensive to insure than hunting rifles because they they have a greater capacity to do harm. 

Because money is always a great motivator, one immediate benefit of insuring guns is that it would change the behavior of some less than vigilant gun owners. People who leave loaded guns in the bedside table or in the glove compartment might reconsider that habit, since they are on the hook for a sizable deductible if someone gets hold of their gun and hurts someone else. Insurance companies would no doubt give policy discounts for gun owners who buy trigger locks or gun safes. Premiums would reflect the gun owners’ risk factors, like arrest and psychiatric histories. The more guns you own, the more it will cost.

The insurance companies will do a lot of the archiving of ballistic information we don’t allow police to do. Insurance companies would want ballistic signatures from every gun they insure. They would need it to verify, in the event a claim is filed, that it was indeed the gun they insure that caused the damage. While it is hardly a substitute for a national ballistics registry that would allow investigators to trace the gun that fired any bullet they recovered, police could subpoena ballistics information from insurance companies, helping in investigations and prosecutions, without ever having to build their own database.

CM189191 said:

PJPOWER said:

CM189191 said:

mace1229 said:

I think better registration is a good place to start.
What would gun insurance do?

It acknowledges the actual societal cost of gun ownership:

The real problem with gun ownership is that they involve "externalities," which is economist-speak for the fact that your gun may be used to hurt others. For instance, when Nancy Lanza purchased her Bushmaster AR-15, she probably weighed the benefits of owning the gun — the joy of ownership — with the price (about $800). But it's unlikely she considered the loss, pain and grief that might follow if it were used by her son to kill 26 innocents. When people fail to consider the broader social costs of choices like buying a gun, they're more likely to do them, and society suffers.

You would need it to buy a gun, and the policy would have to include liability coverage in case that gun injures someone. If a gun owner has no accidents, his premiums go down. Someone who wants to "open carry" his weapon would pay more than someone who keeps it locked at home. Assault weapons would be more expensive to insure than hunting rifles because they they have a greater capacity to do harm. 

Because money is always a great motivator, one immediate benefit of insuring guns is that it would change the behavior of some less than vigilant gun owners. People who leave loaded guns in the bedside table or in the glove compartment might reconsider that habit, since they are on the hook for a sizable deductible if someone gets hold of their gun and hurts someone else. Insurance companies would no doubt give policy discounts for gun owners who buy trigger locks or gun safes. Premiums would reflect the gun owners’ risk factors, like arrest and psychiatric histories. The more guns you own, the more it will cost.

The insurance companies will do a lot of the archiving of ballistic information we don’t allow police to do. Insurance companies would want ballistic signatures from every gun they insure. They would need it to verify, in the event a claim is filed, that it was indeed the gun they insure that caused the damage. While it is hardly a substitute for a national ballistics registry that would allow investigators to trace the gun that fired any bullet they recovered, police could subpoena ballistics information from insurance companies, helping in investigations and prosecutions, without ever having to build their own database.

I see a couple issues with this:
The whole "ballistics signature" idea just would not work.  I don't want to get too technical, but much of it comes down to "what is a gun".  Is a barrel a gun, is a lower/receiver by itself a gun?  The thing about firearms is that they are like legos to the extent that most every part (including the barrel) is interchangeable in most firearms.  Many of the barrels are custom made by the owner themselves.  Not due to decisiveness, but mostly for better performance.  It would impossible to keep accurate ballistic information for any firearm after the original sale at your local Academy Sports.  
Secondly, who is this extra tax (let's call it what it is) going to impact the most?  It would be an annoyance to hunters and hobbyists, but low income people are always the ones that are most effected by costly insurance.  A person living in poverty that has one firearm to protect their house would probably just find a way to skirt any kind of insurance if they could not pay it just like they do with car insurance.  Then there is the possibility that adding extra costs would just increase the lucrative black market or incentives for criminals to try and get their hands on them...I'm not sure that would decrease the gun violence at all.  It may help the 3D printer sales though...

Using gun parts not listed on the policy would void the insurance policy. Have 2 barrels for 1 gun? They would all be listed in the policy.

 As for the cost - how is this any different than today? Do you consider the purchase cost of the gun or ammunition to be a tax as well? Guns are already only a 'right' for people who can afford them.

 Incidentally, this is where I feel the current interpretation of the 2nd Amendment breaks with the rest of the Constitution. All the Amendments are endowed by 'their Creator with certain unalienable Rights'. I can step out of the womb with the right to free speech, privacy, vote, etc; with no accessories needed. I don't need to go out an purchase or acquire anything to exercise my rights.

 With the exception of 2A - for some reason that is the only 'right' people can exercise if they can afford it. All men are created equal, as long as they can afford to buy a gun.

 Perhaps the government could subsidize gun ownership for people who qualify. They would offer funds to purchase arms, training, maybe even a uniform. A sort of well-regulated militia, if you will....

PJPOWER said:

CM189191 said:

PJPOWER said:

CM189191 said:

mace1229 said:

I think better registration is a good place to start.
What would gun insurance do?

It acknowledges the actual societal cost of gun ownership:

The real problem with gun ownership is that they involve "externalities," which is economist-speak for the fact that your gun may be used to hurt others. For instance, when Nancy Lanza purchased her Bushmaster AR-15, she probably weighed the benefits of owning the gun — the joy of ownership — with the price (about $800). But it's unlikely she considered the loss, pain and grief that might follow if it were used by her son to kill 26 innocents. When people fail to consider the broader social costs of choices like buying a gun, they're more likely to do them, and society suffers.

You would need it to buy a gun, and the policy would have to include liability coverage in case that gun injures someone. If a gun owner has no accidents, his premiums go down. Someone who wants to "open carry" his weapon would pay more than someone who keeps it locked at home. Assault weapons would be more expensive to insure than hunting rifles because they they have a greater capacity to do harm. 

Because money is always a great motivator, one immediate benefit of insuring guns is that it would change the behavior of some less than vigilant gun owners. People who leave loaded guns in the bedside table or in the glove compartment might reconsider that habit, since they are on the hook for a sizable deductible if someone gets hold of their gun and hurts someone else. Insurance companies would no doubt give policy discounts for gun owners who buy trigger locks or gun safes. Premiums would reflect the gun owners’ risk factors, like arrest and psychiatric histories. The more guns you own, the more it will cost.

The insurance companies will do a lot of the archiving of ballistic information we don’t allow police to do. Insurance companies would want ballistic signatures from every gun they insure. They would need it to verify, in the event a claim is filed, that it was indeed the gun they insure that caused the damage. While it is hardly a substitute for a national ballistics registry that would allow investigators to trace the gun that fired any bullet they recovered, police could subpoena ballistics information from insurance companies, helping in investigations and prosecutions, without ever having to build their own database.

I see a couple issues with this:
The whole "ballistics signature" idea just would not work.  I don't want to get too technical, but much of it comes down to "what is a gun".  Is a barrel a gun, is a lower/receiver by itself a gun?  The thing about firearms is that they are like legos to the extent that most every part (including the barrel) is interchangeable in most firearms.  Many of the barrels are custom made by the owner themselves.  Not due to decisiveness, but mostly for better performance.  It would impossible to keep accurate ballistic information for any firearm after the original sale at your local Academy Sports.  
Secondly, who is this extra tax (let's call it what it is) going to impact the most?  It would be an annoyance to hunters and hobbyists, but low income people are always the ones that are most effected by costly insurance.  A person living in poverty that has one firearm to protect their house would probably just find a way to skirt any kind of insurance if they could not pay it just like they do with car insurance.  Then there is the possibility that adding extra costs would just increase the lucrative black market or incentives for criminals to try and get their hands on them...I'm not sure that would decrease the gun violence at all.  It may help the 3D printer sales though...

Using gun parts not listed on the policy would void the insurance policy. Have 2 barrels for 1 gun? They would all be listed in the policy.

 As for the cost - how is this any different than today? Do you consider the purchase cost of the gun or ammunition to be a tax as well? Guns are already only a 'right' for people who can afford them.

 Incidentally, this is where I feel the current interpretation of the 2nd Amendment breaks with the rest of the Constitution. All the Amendments are endowed by 'their Creator with certain unalienable Rights'. I can step out of the womb with the right to free speech, privacy, vote, etc; with no accessories needed. I don't need to go out an purchase or acquire anything to exercise my rights.

 With the exception of 2A - for some reason that is the only 'right' people can exercise if they can afford it. All men are created equal, as long as they can afford to buy a gun.

 Perhaps the government could subsidize gun ownership for people who qualify. They would offer funds to purchase arms, training, maybe even a uniform. A sort of well-regulated militia, if you will....

I get what you are saying about the insurance, but it is just not something that could be realistically done.  Technically, all a gun barrel is...is a metal pipe.  You would have to start by broadly changing the definition of a firearm to include pipes that could potentially pass a bullet through them.  There is no possible way that an insurance policy could get a list of all metal pipes a person owns, let alone all of the other components on a firearm.  So let's say then that you are actually able to get records on a lower receiver...and someone steals it and destroys any traceability on that receiver and sticks their own unregistered "metal pipe" on it...how are you going to trace any ballistic information back to the previous owner?  I appreciate your outside-the-box thinking, but it is just simply another unrealistic approach to curbing gun violence by someone that obviously knows fairly little about firearms themselves.  One could say "let's just make firearms disappear and then there would be no guns to hurt people"...While true, how exactly would that happen?  That may be an exaggeration, but you get my point?  Mitigating the factors that effect gun violence is a better approach in my opinion.  Reducing the mental health stigmas so people will get help without strings attached, cleaning up metropolitan gang-ridden areas, providing better education are areas that need to be cleaned up well before any realistic "change you can believe in" could happen.  

mcgruff10 said:

Are there actually people who don't call the police after their firearm has been stolen? Why would they do this?  Are they hiding something?
i mean I don't be check my firearms for sometimes months at a time, maybe they just didn't notice it was missing?

rgambs said:

mcgruff10 said:

Are there actually people who don't call the police after their firearm has been stolen? Why would they do this?  Are they hiding something?
i mean I don't be check my firearms for sometimes months at a time, maybe they just didn't notice it was missing?

Pretty common, gun in the closet, one day it isn't there because a teenager stole it and sold it.

PJPOWER said:

CM189191 said:

PJPOWER said:

CM189191 said:

mace1229 said:

I think better registration is a good place to start.
What would gun insurance do?

It acknowledges the actual societal cost of gun ownership:

The real problem with gun ownership is that they involve "externalities," which is economist-speak for the fact that your gun may be used to hurt others. For instance, when Nancy Lanza purchased her Bushmaster AR-15, she probably weighed the benefits of owning the gun — the joy of ownership — with the price (about $800). But it's unlikely she considered the loss, pain and grief that might follow if it were used by her son to kill 26 innocents. When people fail to consider the broader social costs of choices like buying a gun, they're more likely to do them, and society suffers.

You would need it to buy a gun, and the policy would have to include liability coverage in case that gun injures someone. If a gun owner has no accidents, his premiums go down. Someone who wants to "open carry" his weapon would pay more than someone who keeps it locked at home. Assault weapons would be more expensive to insure than hunting rifles because they they have a greater capacity to do harm. 

Because money is always a great motivator, one immediate benefit of insuring guns is that it would change the behavior of some less than vigilant gun owners. People who leave loaded guns in the bedside table or in the glove compartment might reconsider that habit, since they are on the hook for a sizable deductible if someone gets hold of their gun and hurts someone else. Insurance companies would no doubt give policy discounts for gun owners who buy trigger locks or gun safes. Premiums would reflect the gun owners’ risk factors, like arrest and psychiatric histories. The more guns you own, the more it will cost.

The insurance companies will do a lot of the archiving of ballistic information we don’t allow police to do. Insurance companies would want ballistic signatures from every gun they insure. They would need it to verify, in the event a claim is filed, that it was indeed the gun they insure that caused the damage. While it is hardly a substitute for a national ballistics registry that would allow investigators to trace the gun that fired any bullet they recovered, police could subpoena ballistics information from insurance companies, helping in investigations and prosecutions, without ever having to build their own database.

I see a couple issues with this:
The whole "ballistics signature" idea just would not work.  I don't want to get too technical, but much of it comes down to "what is a gun".  Is a barrel a gun, is a lower/receiver by itself a gun?  The thing about firearms is that they are like legos to the extent that most every part (including the barrel) is interchangeable in most firearms.  Many of the barrels are custom made by the owner themselves.  Not due to decisiveness, but mostly for better performance.  It would impossible to keep accurate ballistic information for any firearm after the original sale at your local Academy Sports.  
Secondly, who is this extra tax (let's call it what it is) going to impact the most?  It would be an annoyance to hunters and hobbyists, but low income people are always the ones that are most effected by costly insurance.  A person living in poverty that has one firearm to protect their house would probably just find a way to skirt any kind of insurance if they could not pay it just like they do with car insurance.  Then there is the possibility that adding extra costs would just increase the lucrative black market or incentives for criminals to try and get their hands on them...I'm not sure that would decrease the gun violence at all.  It may help the 3D printer sales though...

Using gun parts not listed on the policy would void the insurance policy. Have 2 barrels for 1 gun? They would all be listed in the policy.

 As for the cost - how is this any different than today? Do you consider the purchase cost of the gun or ammunition to be a tax as well? Guns are already only a 'right' for people who can afford them.

 Incidentally, this is where I feel the current interpretation of the 2nd Amendment breaks with the rest of the Constitution. All the Amendments are endowed by 'their Creator with certain unalienable Rights'. I can step out of the womb with the right to free speech, privacy, vote, etc; with no accessories needed. I don't need to go out an purchase or acquire anything to exercise my rights.

 With the exception of 2A - for some reason that is the only 'right' people can exercise if they can afford it. All men are created equal, as long as they can afford to buy a gun.

 Perhaps the government could subsidize gun ownership for people who qualify. They would offer funds to purchase arms, training, maybe even a uniform. A sort of well-regulated militia, if you will....

I get what you are saying about the insurance, but it is just not something that could be realistically done.  Technically, all a gun barrel is...is a metal pipe.  You would have to start by broadly changing the definition of a firearm to include pipes that could potentially pass a bullet through them.  There is no possible way that an insurance policy could get a list of all metal pipes a person owns, let alone all of the other components on a firearm.  So let's say then that you are actually able to get records on a lower receiver...and someone steals it and destroys any traceability on that receiver and sticks their own unregistered "metal pipe" on it...how are you going to trace any ballistic information back to the previous owner?  I appreciate your outside-the-box thinking, but it is just simply another unrealistic approach to curbing gun violence by someone that obviously knows fairly little about firearms themselves.  One could say "let's just make firearms disappear and then there would be no guns to hurt people"...While true, how exactly would that happen?  That may be an exaggeration, but you get my point?  Mitigating the factors that effect gun violence is a better approach in my opinion.  Reducing the mental health stigmas so people will get help without strings attached, cleaning up metropolitan gang-ridden areas, providing better education are areas that need to be cleaned up well before any realistic "change you can believe in" could happen.  

rgambs said:

mcgruff10 said:

Are there actually people who don't call the police after their firearm has been stolen? Why would they do this?  Are they hiding something?
i mean I don't be check my firearms for sometimes months at a time, maybe they just didn't notice it was missing?

Pretty common, gun in the closet, one day it isn't there because a teenager stole it and sold it.

CM189191 said:

PJPOWER said:

As much as I love your car analogy, you are most definitely comparing apples and oranges. It would be more like being able to convert it to a ford van if you switched out the barrel or upper receiver in its entirety.  And remember, upper receivers are not considered "guns" by any legal standard.  
As far as the 2nd amendment being about acquiring or buying something...I think it is a moot point...and I would like to mention that the 5th Ammendment might have something to say to your contrary.

We are not talking about a legal standard.  We are talking about definitions for insurance coverage.  

Goddamm car analogy.  If you insure your car, that includes the tires, mirrors, seats, etc.  It doesn't just cover the engine.

The Fifth Amendment creates a number of rights relevant to both criminal and civil legal proceedings.  In criminal cases, the Fifth Amendment guarantees the right to a grand jury, forbids “double jeopardy,” and protects against self-incrimination.  It also requires that “due process of law” be part of any proceeding that denies a citizen “life, liberty or property” and requires the government to compensate citizens when it takes private property for public use.  

I am not required to purchase or acquire any physical possessions in order to exercise my 5th Amendment rights.