Educated guesses as to overall percentage of population that owns an AR-15?

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Approx 49% of American households own a gun. The vast majority are not gun-enthusiasts.

I'd say that 1% of American households owning an AR15 is a very generous estimation.
 
BenEzra, what numbers are you running though? There really aren't any of the type that would provide enough data to really make an educated guess, if we get right down to it. The closes we can really get a 'max possible'.
Say we have manufacturer XaX. Xax has been in business for the last 3 years, and has produced 33,000 lowers a year, a lower being the only part that counts. So that's 99,000 lowers floating about. However, not all of those have been sold yet. Of those that have been sold by XaX to dealers, how many have been sold to customers? Of those, how many are in the hands of law enforcement agencies, security folks, etc.(basically, not in private ownership). How many of those sold to private owners have been repeat buyers?

I'm pretty sure there's more questions that could be asked before we get relevant numbers. We could substitute 'EBR' for lowers to be more general, but we still end up with a lot of floaters, even if the overall number is higher.
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One can look at overall sales figures and make an educated guess as to how many are multiples owned by the same person (say, type/owners=1.3 or whatever). Exceeding the number of hunters in the U.S. is actually a pretty easy target, since only around 13 to 16 million people hunt in any given year based on hunting license data, and the Georgia Arms Collectors Association put the number of SKS's alone in U.S. hands at 7 million some years ago. Factor in the myriad of other "assault weapon" models (including non-rifles) that have been on the civilian market for the past 60+ years, many of which have also sold in the millions, and you'll have a pretty good shot at "assault weapon" owners exceeding hunters.

The BATFE offers (incomplete) sales data on their website by manufacturer, so you can make some educated guesses about numbers sold, but the data isn't as solid as I'd like.
 
Mr_Pale_Horse said:
For IPSC major scoring, the .223 is out, therefore 308 guns dominate. So is the 9mm, so 40's, 45's or 38 supers.
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I don't know why you would post something like this, but it's nowhere near true.

Nobody shoots a major-caliber rifle in IMG or USPSA 3-gun unless they're shooting in a division that mandates it. Under IMG rules (which are by far the most common) there is no major/minor split, just a power floor of 125. So no advantage to shooting a .308 rifle. Under USPSA rules, up close, the extra recoil and muzzle flip (not to mention the weight) of a major-caliber rifle negates any advantage gained from major PF scoring. At long ranges, the targets are usually self-reseting steel, which are scored either an A or a Miss.

I would estimate that 95% or more of the 3-gun shooters in the US own an AR. That said, there are maybe 5000 active 3-gun shooters in the country. Really just a drop in the bucket.

Nationwide? No idea. Maybe as high as 30-50% of serious shooters*, maybe 1% of gun owners overall.

- Chris

* - I define "serious shooters" broadly as, "Those gun owners who shoot and practice a lot, and who actively seek to improve their skill at arms." Again speaking broadly, I've found that such shooters tend to gravitate towards certain types of firearms, and ARs are one of those types.
 
A better question might be, what percentage of U.S. Citizens SHOULD own an AR. I'd like one, and don't own one. But I don't know if more than 5% of people I've met here in Missouri (a Brady org. D+ state) should be allowed to have them, all human rights and American liberties considered. I believe in the second amendment, and think the citizenry should be more armed, but like I said, what percentage are we looking for here?? My $.02 is that around 5% should have a modern "assault" rifle. The rest.....well......The rest can reload the brass and tend to the wounded I suppose. ;) Let me know if I'm off base, I'm curious.
 
I went with a Saiga as my first evil black rifle ... but one day, an AR will be on there, too.

One reason I went with the Saiga instead is that as with many kinds of guns (I won't name names, because that would take all day), there are loud lover and louder haters, and there are some pretty vocal AR haters.

"$Gun X is perfect, and never breaks, and if it does break it's your own fault!"

vs.

"If you really want to hit someone with $Gun Z, make sure you pistol with them with it while they'e asleep, because it will never function as a firearm."

I know my Saiga is not as accurate as the average AR, and I know ARs have better recoil control, as well as all the cool accessories. But, I'm not worried about being strong enough to hurt my Saiga in any significant way ;)

I look forward to buying an AR , but I've got plenty of knowledge to accrue in the meantime.

timothy
 
Exceeding the number of hunters in the U.S. is actually a pretty easy target, since only around 13 to 16 million people hunt in any given year based on hunting license data,
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http://www.nssf.org/IndustryResearch/FAQ-ans.cfm?Qno=02&AoI=generic


I would actually place my bet that there are far more hunters in the country than 'assault rifle' owners.

The typical estimate of the number of gun owners in the USA is between 90-100 million. Even if we assume that a fairly high percentage of gun owners own an 'assault rifle' like 10%, it still falls way short of the number of hunters.

It might be cultural perception that a significant portion of the population owns them. In my state, there are approximately 3/4 of a million regular hunters- hunters actually make up a very significant portion of gun owners in my state if not the vast majority. Very few of them own an EBR- in fact most will think of you as some sort of nut case if you even admit to owning one- the numbers aren't much different in places like Illinois or Minnesota. . In other states where other shooting sports are more popular and hunting much less so, you'll probably see EBRs more commonly.
 
The last few times I've been to the range I haven't seen a single AR there. Last summer when I brought mine, an older guy asked me if "that thing was legal" for me to own. My point being that there are a lot of gun owners who shoot regularly and an AR is not even on their radar.

Another thing to look at is general demographics; how many gun owners own a rifle that cost more than $800... period? I know several gun owners who own (something like) a few old hunting rifles they inherited, a .22, and a shotgun. I'd guess the majority of gun owners have "collections" like that, give or take a lever action or a mil-surp here or there.

I think there is an age factor too, it appears to me that guys somewhere between 21 and 40+/- years old who own multiple guns are much more likely to own an AR (or two...).

My guess would be 5% or less of all gun owners own an AR -- and 75% of AR owners own more than one of them.
 
Vastly depends on your state of laws

The republic of California < 0.0001%

Florida > 27%

have to specify by state since there are crazy groups of Democrats and laws scattered about.
 
According to the NRA, the AR platform (read AR15?)
is the "...most popular gun in the US today"*

There are a number of ways that statement can be interpreted:

1. Most popular based on sales in a given period of time (ie year, 2007)
2. Most popular based on numbers registered.
3. most popular re: a NRA poll with statistically significant numbers of replies
4. most popular long gun vs all guns owned

Remember:
all you posters here represent a cross section of gun owners -
go to www.AR15.com and you may be surprised by numbers of members etc.

Anecdotal evidence means squat!
I came to this site from AR15.com for a specific question regarding rifles and I
stayed as a result of the quality of information and general level of intelligent banter ...
yes, thats a compliment!

In fact, its all you guys' fault that I caught the rifle fever!

That's one bug I appreciate catching.....:D

Thanks, guys!

Docgary

*No...I dont have the reference or specific quote -
However, Im sure if you search the NRA site for a few minutes, it will be found.
 
I don't know why you would post something like this, but it's nowhere near true.
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I stopped competing in 1994. At my club (average age then was 40) mouse guns and crunchen-tickers were disliked. Times change.
 
Whatever it is now, sales are picking up steam. AR's have become extremely popular. 5 or 6 years ago, it wasnt very often that someone else would show up at my local range with an AR. Nowadays, AR's are the most prevalant rifle style on the line. Their popularity has exploded.
 
Many of us want what they have...

Anyone that has an interest in military style rifles and has seen any pictures of US troops
involved in the GWOT has seen many M16/M4 rifles. Think of it as 3rd party advertising.
I will have two Colt LE 6920s very soon, they will compliment my M14 collection :evil:
 
http://www.nssf.org/IndustryResearch...02&AoI=generic


I would actually place my bet that there are far more hunters in the country than 'assault rifle' owners.

The typical estimate of the number of gun owners in the USA is between 90-100 million. Even if we assume that a fairly high percentage of gun owners own an 'assault rifle' like 10%, it still falls way short of the number of hunters.

It might be cultural perception that a significant portion of the population owns them. In my state, there are approximately 3/4 of a million regular hunters- hunters actually make up a very significant portion of gun owners in my state if not the vast majority. Very few of them own an EBR- in fact most will think of you as some sort of nut case if you even admit to owning one- the numbers aren't much different in places like Illinois or Minnesota. . In other states where other shooting sports are more popular and hunting much less so, you'll probably see EBRs more commonly.
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We do have hard data on hunting licenses, which is tracked annually.

http://www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/FHW01.pdf

They show 13.0 million licensed hunters over the age of 16 as having hunted in 2000. If you add in hunters under 16, you get ~14.7 million active hunters in 2000. Add in a couple million more for holders of lifetime licenses. Your link's highest estimate is 43 million who have ever hunted even once in their lives. I'm a nonhunter, but I've officially hunted once (small game, 15+ years ago), so people like me are included in that statistic.

The hunting license number has fallen considerably since 2000; I don't have a link to the current numbers but they are two or three million lower now, as I recall. I think it's pretty solid that the number of active hunters is well under 20 million, probably closer to 15-16 million now.

I'd put the number of people who own "assault weapons" as defined by H.R.1022 (not even counting those the pre-1861 magazine capacity limit would hit) well in excess of that 15-16 million. Remember that not all "assault weapons" as defined by H.R.1022 are black, or even modern-looking (e.g. the SKS, M1 Garand, M1 carbine, Ruger mini-14, etc.). So the numbers are at least comparable, and again I didn't even count those who own over-10-round pistols and whatnot.
 
If there are 80,000,000 gun owners 2% of this population would be a large base if each owner had only one. If population of U.S. is 300,000,000 I would put the number of AR owners at less than .5%.
 
I just picked up my first AR-15 yesterday. I am the only person that I know of that owns one, and all of my male relatives (out to 1st cousins) own multiple firearms.
 
We do have hard data on hunting licenses, which is tracked annually.

http://www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/FHW01.pdf

They show 13.0 million licensed hunters over the age of 16 as having hunted in 2000. If you add in hunters under 16, you get ~14.7 million active hunters in 2000. Add in a couple million more for holders of lifetime licenses. Your link's highest estimate is 43 million who have ever hunted even once in their lives. I'm a nonhunter, but I've officially hunted once (small game, 15+ years ago), so people like me are included in that statistic.
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Wow! I never would have guessed that the numbers would be so low...
 
In my extened family of 20 people we all have guns of one sort or another in our homes. Nine of the 20 are active shooters. Between all of us we own 5 AR's, 1 AK, 2 SKS's, 1 M-1 and 1 Mini-14. So from this data we can say that 45% of the USA own EBR's and 25% of the US own AR's. LOL
 
I don't. In fact, I'd be hard put to guess the number of my shooting pals that do. Most of my shooting is SASS, and Ugly Black Guns don't exactly form the major topic of conversation there.

~~~Mat
 
Wow! I never would have guessed that the numbers would be so low...
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That's still a lot of people, and when they all hit the fields on the same day, you really notice.

If every EBR owner in the United States went to the range on the same day once a year, we'd be a lot more visible than we are.
 
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