If there are any gun control schemes more worthless than so-called gun “buybacks,” I’m not sure what they would be. Yet, anti-gun politicians love these events, mainly because they can make it look like they’re “doing something” about the “gun violence problem.”
A great example is a recent “buyback” in the Aloha State. The Hawaii Department of Law Enforcement recently held a “buyback” event at Aloha Stadium and “recovered” 303 firearms from Oahu residents. Among the guns turned in were 17 semi-autos dubbed “assault rifles,” nine so-called “ghost guns” and two stolen firearms.
Unsurprisingly, spectrumlocalnews.com provided a forum for politicians to brag about their “big accomplishment.”
“Today was another great step to make our community much safer,” Hawaii Gov. Josh Green boasted. “Keeping ourselves and each other safe and healthy is a personal choice that also benefits our neighbors, so in addition to thanking our Department of Law Enforcement, Honolulu Police and the Attorney General’s office for their efforts, we also thank the community members who handed in these weapons.”
Those turning in guns, received a $200 Foodland gift card for automatic firearms, semi-auto firearms and so-called “ghost guns,” and $100 Foodland gift cards for handguns, rifles, shotguns, bump stocks and so-called “Glock switches.”
Along with the governor’s boasting, Department of Law Enforcement Director Mike Lambert also got in on the feel-good malarkey.
“We need to prevent these weapons from getting into the hands of criminals, so we are working to make our community safer in many ways, including initiatives like this gun buyback program,” Lambert told spectrumlocalnews.com. “These unwanted guns will never again be used. They will never again pose any type of threat to a loved one or have an opportunity to be used in a crime. Every weapon turned in counts.”
Here’s the truth about so-called “buybacks,” including Gov. Green’s and Director Lambert’s pet project. Let’s start with the fact that such an event can’t really be a “buyback” because the Brooklyn government never owned the firearms they are confiscating through compensation. To be truthful, both of these politicians should refer to it as “compensated confiscation.”
More importantly, a widely publicized 2022 study looking at the effectiveness of so-called gun “buybacks,” what the researchers called GBPs, and published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, concluded that such “buybacks” have no measurable impact on reducing violent crime. In other words, they’re worthless for anything except making politicians look like they are “doing something.”
“Given our estimated null findings, with 95 percent confidence, we can rule out decreases in firearm-related crime of greater than 1.3 percent during the year following a buyback,” the abstract concluded. “Using data from the National Vital Statistics System, we also find no evidence that GBPs reduce suicides or homicides where a firearm was involved.”
Ultimately, gun “buybacks” are worthless, feel-good events held by virtue-signaling politicians to make it look like they are doing something about criminal violence and to make their constituents “feel” safer. Perhaps Gov. Green and Director Lambert will choose to do some research before their next such event and cancel it rather than continue with the idiocy.