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US sales of guns and ammunition soar amid coronavirus panic buying

theguardian.com

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Re: US sales of guns and ammunition soar amid coronavirus panic buying

#21
post #16

In a stressed society with low friction access to fierams, buying an assault rifle is just working your way towards Nash equilibrium. Terrifying.

Do you mean an actual assault rifle, or just a "scary black gun" that is functionally equivalent to any other modern semi-automatic hunting rifle (and shoots lower powered rounds than many common hunting rifles)? If it's the former, there's nothing low-friction about it. You have to fill out more forms, pay more money, get more background checks, etc. etc., yadda yadda, and you can't buy any such weapon manufactured…

I meant an actual Nash equilibrium.

My experience of firearms is limited to three years in the (not US) military so I'll deffer to you on comparative merits of semi automatic vs hunting rifles available to civilians on the US market.

Re: US sales of guns and ammunition soar amid coronavirus panic buying

#24

Between the economy, the oil price war, the politicization of politics, and most pressingly the virus, 2019ncov is proving to be the potential trigger for wide scale geopolitical change and possibly insecurity. States are going to go into quarantine one by one with little to no coordination. Governments and law agencies will be commandeering emergency powers. We are sitting on a major pressure point and it's impossib…

> If the economy doesn't recover soon, people are going to grow increasingly hungry and desperate without radical federal measures.

This might not entirely be a bad thing [1]. Things will need to get worse so they can get better.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Deal

Re: US sales of guns and ammunition soar amid coronavirus panic buying

#25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having a gun in your home also increase the probability that one of your kids can find it and kill another of your kids by accident. It is a tradeoff.

Respect for firearms is an extremely important skill to teach a child. Having grown up hunting, this was taught to me at a very young age. But more kids die from drowning in pools than from accidental firearm discharges, and it's also important to teach your child water safety and swimming skills.

I agree. Swimming pools are more dangerous than the people realize. Never left the children unattended nearby a swimming pool.
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