Baltimore Business Journal
APRIL 2-8.1993
'Guns: Killers or Job
producers
From hunting to Funerals they pump $900 M
into State
No one knows exactly how much money
the gun industry in Maryland
pumps into the state’s economy every
year.
But conservative estimates based on
an exhaustive review of every facet
of the industry may put the price tag
at about $900 million — though the
figure is probably much higher,
according to a survey conducted by
the Business Journal.
‘1 would say that’s a very close
figure,” observed Sanford M. Abrams,
vice president of the Maryland
Licensed Firearms Dealers
Association, and co-owner of Valley
Guns in Baltimore, one of the area’s
largest retail stores.
Assets
Measuring guns
Liabilities
$296M in retail sales
$728,000 on bulletproof vests'
$1.5M to upgrade
police weapons'
$45,000 annual prison
housing
costs
per
prisoner
$5.SM for city
housing project
police force
$2.SM hospital casts'
$728,000 on
bullet-proof vests'
$1.5M to upgrade
police weapons'
$45,000
annual
prison
housing
costs per prisoner
$5.SM for city
housing project
police force
$2.SM hospital
casts'
$316M on hunting
trips
$2.5M at gun show
sales
$1.5M on funerals
$42M In Beretta sales
That’s enough money to pay for about seven Orioles baseball teams,
or field a team of 28 Cal Ripken Jrs with contracts valued at $323
million over the next five years.
The survey reviewed almost every quantifiable area of the gun
industry ranging from studies of the hunting industry and medical costs
associated with gun shot victims to speculative estimates by law
enforcement agencies of the gun- running industry in Maryland and the
closely guarded revenue information of privately held Beretta U.S.A.
Corp. in Southern Maryland.
According to law enforcement agencies, the Ft. Lauderdale-based
National Association of Federally Licensed Firearms Dealers • and other
industry sources, the biggest revenue generators in Maryland’s gun
industry are as follows:

Hunting. A 1985 study conducted by the state’s Department of
Natural Resources found that hunters spent about $316.3 million
(1992 dollars) for lodging and food, ammunition, gun licenses,
stamps, tags, permits and other expenses related to hunting with
fire’ arms.

Gun dealers. Maryland’s stale and federally licensed gun dealers
sell an estimated $296.92 million in guns annually, or about
$5.71 million worth of handguns, pistols and rifles each week.
And that doesn’t include the estimated 3114 million gun inventory
already displayed under glass cases or hanging on the walls of
more than 500 stores.

Gun show admissions. About 500,000 customers attend gun shows in
Maryland annually. They pay about $2.5 million to see and buy
everything from Civil War-vintage muskets to the latest fashion
in semi-automatic pistols. No one has a clue as to how many guns
are purchased at these shows because they haven’t been regulated.

Baretta. The Italian gunmaker has two factories in Maryland. The
480 employees at plants in Accokeek and Pocomoke City have a
combined payroll of about $12 million. Based on monthly sales
volume figures, industry observers believe that the company could
have annual revenues of about $42 million in Maryland. But that
figure should probably be several millions of dollars higher
because the $42 million estimate is based on how much the federal
government pays the company for firearms. That per unit price, in
fact, is three times lower than what a consumer might pay for the
same gun in a retail store.

Funeral expenses. An estimated $1.59 million was spent to bury
376 Marylanders killed with firearms in 1991, according to police
and funeral industry estimates on the average cost per funeral.

Gunrunning. The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms is
just now beginning to conduct highly secretive probes of
gunrunning in Baltimore and surrounding problem areas — most
notably, Prince George’s County.
A cache of some 32.06 million worth of guns was stolen in
Maryland in 1991, the latest available figures reported by the stale
police. ATF and police sources say it is virtually impossible to
estimate how big this niche of the industry is. It’s difficult to
detect so-called straw purchases’’ of guns by persons forbidden 10 buy
them because of their criminal records.
In addition, no one knows how many guns trade hands through
national publications such as the Gun List or Shotgun News, where
consumers can shop for anything ranging from a Chinese Tokareve handgun
for $89 to FRG-2 sniper rifles for $5,900.
The ATF is spending some $1 million in salaries and investigative
resources on a 2-year-old first time-ever project in Baltimore called
the “Achilles Group.”
The special task force, which has been formed in 20 other major
cities around the country, is looking at trace studies of guns
recovered from violent crimes — mostly in the eastern district of the
city, said Karl Stankovic, assistant special agent in charge of
Baltimore’s newly opened ATF office.
A preliminary study of some 1,300 guns recovered in violent
crimes last year revealed about 46 percent came from federally licensed
firearms dealers in Maryland, Stankovic said. And, he added, the
majority of those guns came from six dealers: two in the city, three in
Baltimore County and one in Anne Arundel County.
“Maryland is the source for its illegal
guns.’’ said Stankovic, who declined to identify the stores where guns
were bought for use in violent crimes.
The reverse trend appears to be the case with other states,
according to a review of similar Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearm
gun tracing studies conducted in New York City and Washington, D.C.
An ATF study conducted last year by field offices in those cities
found that a quarter of the guns recovered in Washington had come from
Maryland while a barely measurable number recovered in New York could
be traced back to Maryland. A huge 40 percent of the New York guns had
been shipped from neighboring Virginia where buying handguns is so easy
that the slate had become an armory for criminals
While the dollar value on illegal gun- running is difficult to
quantify, the state has conducted a survey to assess the economic
affects of hunting for deer and migratory waterfowl in the state.
The state’s Department of Natural Resources found in 1985 that
hunters spent about $316.39 million on duck stamps, hunting licenses,
ammo, lodging, food and other gun-related expenses.
“It has been really big business until recent years,” said Larry
Hindman, director of Maryland’s migratory bird program. The sale of
duck stamps by the state helps to improve wetlands where ducks and
Canadian geese frequent during migratory season, he said.
“If you were here in the heyday of goose hunting, we drew people
from all over the world,” Hindman said.
Editor’s comment: You’re blood is now boiling – how can the gun industry be
so crass as to count the economic impact of funerals as a positive benefit?
And why is this in a humor website? Check the date. April Fools!!!