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Comment by galacticpony | Hacker News Reader

The overwhelming majority of guns on the black market have been sold legally at one point. Obviously, legal gun sales are much easier to limit than illegal ones. How would you tackle illegal sales?

The same statistic probably applies to countries with stricter gun laws, it's the sheer amount of weapons available that make the difference. The US gun laws have created a flood of weapons into black markets, especially in South America, where the Mafia is often armed better than the police.

It's safe to say that this development cannot be reversed at this point, but it can still be curbed.

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Hold the legal owner liable for anything done with the gun?

Secondarily, this would lead to insurance on gun ownership, which would lead to insurance companies rewarding responsible gun ownership with lower rates and punish irresponsible actors.

This implies that gun ownership can be reliably tracked, which is not the case today, though certainly possible in theory.

You basically want to increase legal liabilities (which already exist) to an extreme, but you will then have trouble finding any insurance company that is willing to cover the kinds of damages that can be caused by guns at a rate affordable to an individual.

Either of these things will require legislation that will receive massive pushback from the gun lobby. In a country where even basic background checks or limiting of certain weapon types hasn't been realized, your ideas seem almost utopian.

Having said that, I don't disagree in principle.

Switzerland seems to have this one nailed. Both parties are required by law to have documentation of a firearm sale, and that documentation must be retained for ten years. If you don't have control of the weapon and you don't have documentation then you're in trouble. And I suspect you insurance won't cover any costs if you're in violation of the law.

>How would you tackle illegal sales?

Don't focus on the individual illegal gun sale. Focus on the big operations. Like the cartels.

You haven't answered the question. What would you actually do? What could you do? Which procedures could you apply that are not already being applied?

You cannot stop cartels from dealing drugs, despite massive efforts, what could you do to prevent them from dealing weapons?

Furthemore, while cartels are certainly important, the majority of gun-related homicides within the US are caused by small-time criminals, within a social fabric that facilites small-time illegal gun sales.

>What would you actually do?

Well, it's up to the smart peoples working on this to figure out how to take down the cartels and the big time players that are importing guns illegally into the United States and selling them illegally.

>...the majority of gun-related homicides within the US are caused by small-time criminals.

So what are you saying? Focus on the small time criminals?

The problem with the cartels is the other way around: They are illegally importing guns which been sold legally in the US into South America, where they outgun local police forces. That's why lax US gun legislation isn't just a national matter.

I don't think there is a solution for the small-time criminals having access to guns, all you can do at this point is try and drive the black market price up, by making it tougher to get new guns.

Either problems require new legislation, which the gun lobby is blocking at every step of the way.

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