firearm homicide rate fell by 59 percent, and the firearm suicide rate fell by 65 percent, in the decade after the law was introduced, without a parallel increase in non-firearm homicides and suicides.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/08/02/did-gun-control-work-in-australia/
A few points.
1. You still have not answered the question about how you would get rid of the millions of illegal firearms in the country. Since I have asked you about 5 or 6 times now with no answer, it is obvious you have NO plan whatsoever, which makes banning firearms impossible and your argument pointless.
2. A few key points from the study you posted.
In terms of the absolute numbers of guns destroyed, Australiaâs gun buyback ranks as the largest destruction of civilian firearms in any country over the period 1991
â 2006. Its effect was to reduce Australia's firearms stock by around one-fifth, more than 650,000 firearms. In United States terms, this would be equivalent to a reduction in the firearms stock of forty million firearms
So it wasn't a total ban, was it? 1/5th of the firearms. Additionally, Australia does not have an estimated 4 million illegal guns on the street (this estimation was during the Clinton era, so it's probably a LOT more now).
the ability of an island nation to restrict illegal gun imports, coupled with the absence of any domestic gun manufacturers producing for the retail market, meant that legal restrictions on gun ownership were more likely to âbiteâ in Australia than would be the case in countries with porous land borders
I guess you can't really apply what happened there to what could happen here, eh?
the withdrawal of 3,500 guns per 100,000 individuals reduced the firearm suicide rate by close to 80% and had no statistically significant effect on non-fi
rearm death rates. Estimates of the effect on firearm homicides are less precise,
but point estimates suggest that the firearm homicide rate also dropped by a substantial proportion
Ah, the rub. Got it, so suicides decreased by gun weapon (however, if a person wants to kill themselves, they'll do it some other way) and estimates of lower homicide are less precise.
This paper therefore provides evidence that reduced access to firearms lowers
firearm death rates and may also lower overall death by suicide and homicide.
Nothing proven substantially.
Another concern is the accuracy of data on firearm availability. Duggan
(2001) notes that a lack of reliable data on gun ownership makes many of these studies rather difficult to rely on. He uses subscriptions to gun magazines (which he shows are closely correlated with firearm ownership) as a proxy for firearm ownership
LOL!!!!
I read the first 20 pages of the report. Feel free to do that instead of taking the spin the blog is talking about. The report admits significant flaws in the ability to project it's data upon any conclusion, and mentions several times that there can't be a comparison between the action in Australia to potential action in the US, and that firearm homicide decline (if truly the decline is statistically proven - which the study says it is not comfortable with) could be the result of many different "exogenous" reasons.
Nice try, FC! Fail again, though.
Next time, spend the hour reading through the support data like I did.
