I have an old Noble Model 40 pump missing a cartridge lifter that I bought at a gunshow for $8. Over the years I have used it basically as a single shot to test fire ammo that might ruin a good barrel (bird bombs, rock salt, BP blanks, red meteor flares, Dragon's Breath, out of date paper shotshells).
I would not sell it at a "buyback" at any price. Like most anti-gun measures, Gun Buybacks are as big a fraud as public burnings of Beatles' White Albums as a response to the Manson Family "Helter Skelter" murders.
As the sunset of the 1994 Assault Weapon Ban approached in 2004, the National Research Council reviewed academic research of the sort that would pass the door of the Amercian Society of Criminology as working papers for serious discussion and/or be published in peer-reviewed journals under JEL subject classification K42 - impact of law on illegal behavior.
Gun Buy-Backs
Gun buy-back programs involve a government or private group paying individuals to turn in guns they possess. The programs do not require the participants to identify themselves, in order to encourage participation by offenders or those with weapons used in crimes. The guns are then destroyed. The theoretical premise for gun buy-back programs is that the program will lead to fewer guns on the streets because fewer guns are available for either theft or trade, and that consequently violence will decline. It is the committee’s view that the theory underlying gun buy-back programs is badly flawed and the empirical evidence demonstrates the ineffectiveness of these programs.
The theory on which gun buy-back programs is based is flawed in three respects.
First, the guns that are typically surrendered in gun buy-backs are those that are least likely to be used in criminal activities. Typically, the guns turned in tend to be of two types: (1) old, malfunctioning guns whose resale value is less than the reward offered in buy-back programs or (2) guns owned by individuals who derive little value from the possession of the guns (e.g., those who have inherited guns). The Police Executive Research Forum (1996) found this in their analysis of the differences between weapons handed in and those used in crimes. In contrast, those who are either using guns to carry out crimes or as protection in the course of engaging in other illegal activities, such as drug selling, have actively acquired their guns and are unlikely to want to participate in such programs.
Second, because replacement guns are relatively easily obtained, the actual decline in the number of guns on the street may be smaller than the number of guns that are turned in.
Third, the likelihood that any particular gun will be used in a crime in a given year is low. In 1999, approximately 6,500 homicides were committed with handguns. There are approximately 70 million handguns in the United States. Thus, if a different handgun were used in each homicide, the likelihood that a particular handgun would be used to kill an individual in a particular year is 1 in 10,000. The typical gun buy-back program yields less than 1,000 guns. Even ignoring the first two points made above (the guns turned in are unlikely to be used by criminals and may be replaced by purchases of new guns), one would expect a reduction of less than one-tenth of one homicide per year in response to such a gun buy-back program. The program might be cost-effective if those were the correct parameters, but the small scale makes it highly unlikely that its effects would be detected.
In light of the weakness in the theory underlying gun buy-backs, it is not surprising that research evaluations of U.S. efforts have consistently failed to document any link between such programs and reductions in gun violence (Callahan et al., 1994; Police Executive Research Forum, 1996; Rosenfeld, 1996).
National Academy of Sciences, National Research Council, "Firearms and Violence: A Critical Review" (2004)
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