I got curious and decided to try to come up with a decent number for the number of guns in the US.
So I took the 200 million estimate of 1994 done by NCJRS, which was based on a phone survey and is one of the better sources of data up until 1994 (to my knowledge).
Then, using the ATF statistics/records, I started adding on top of that for the years 1998 - 2005 (which is currently available). I summed the total manufactured and then substracted the number exported. To fill in the years 1995-1997 and the years 2006 and 2007 I am going to use a simple mean of the 98-05 numbers as there isn't a huge range between the numbers. It seems to be relatively constant (relatively of course).
The roadblock I've hit though is that the ATF records list machine guns. The ATF doesn't register newly manufactured machine guns to civilians via the NFA due to the Firearm Owners Protection Act (I believe was the one). So you know those are for law enforcement, and some of the other guns too. I'm trying to get a rough idea of how many guns manufactured per year go to law enforcement. Surely there must be some statistic on weapon purchases by LE agencies annually? Basically, I'll subtract that before adding on the new weapons estimate for 94-07 to get my number.
I know this isn't exactly scientific, but it's just to satisfy my own curiosity and get a rough idea.
So I took the 200 million estimate of 1994 done by NCJRS, which was based on a phone survey and is one of the better sources of data up until 1994 (to my knowledge).
Then, using the ATF statistics/records, I started adding on top of that for the years 1998 - 2005 (which is currently available). I summed the total manufactured and then substracted the number exported. To fill in the years 1995-1997 and the years 2006 and 2007 I am going to use a simple mean of the 98-05 numbers as there isn't a huge range between the numbers. It seems to be relatively constant (relatively of course).
The roadblock I've hit though is that the ATF records list machine guns. The ATF doesn't register newly manufactured machine guns to civilians via the NFA due to the Firearm Owners Protection Act (I believe was the one). So you know those are for law enforcement, and some of the other guns too. I'm trying to get a rough idea of how many guns manufactured per year go to law enforcement. Surely there must be some statistic on weapon purchases by LE agencies annually? Basically, I'll subtract that before adding on the new weapons estimate for 94-07 to get my number.
I know this isn't exactly scientific, but it's just to satisfy my own curiosity and get a rough idea.