Taxes on guns and ammo

[Jonnin]

Late '80s more likely, but anyway...

This kind of sounds like the people who say health care is a right. So if it's a right then it should be FREE! Right?

I do have the right to keep and bear arms, but that doesn't mean I have a right to obtain them at someone else's expense. Same with health care I (should) have the right to see any doctor I want, whenever I want without interference from the gubmint. But I have to pay market price for it.

I agree to an extent the the gov makes firearms more expensive because of regulation, taxes, etc. But they do that with everything. Yes, the feds have a hard-on about making weapons hard for the common man to acquire, but I can still get a pretty good facsimile of our troops' battle weapon for under $500, which, thanks to inflation, isn't really all that much.

Ammo has gone up and down in price for the last few years thanks to panic buying, but its still affordable in bulk. At the moment anyway.

 

That is not the issue at all.  I don't think ANY serious 2nd amend supporter type person is going to ask for free guns and ammo.  Most are totally against govt handouts.   However (is it switzerland and isreal?) some countries provide each home with a gun and ammo for defense and common good of the state.  I could be down with THAT as a GOOD USE of our taxes and a good way to dispose of worn, but not worn out, military surplus. 

 

The issue is about the government and its ability to tax a thing out of the reach of the people.   The goverment could sign in a tax on ammo of $100/ per primer sold (whether encased in brass or loose).   That would make shooting anything other than a flintlock just about impossible for most people.   All it takes is a supermajority of gun control retards to do it.   Or they could use the EPA to ban the use of lead, forcing expensive substitutes.   Or they could declare smokeless powder to be a dangerous explosive not to be sold to the public because it was used in a bomb once.   Two of these have actually been attempted, in the pre-bill stages at least, in congress.    The powder one was going to limit the amount that could be stored in one place to a very low amount, effectively making it impossible to ship or sell from reloading stores/etc.   And the EPA one was also attempted at least twice as best I can remember.  The third one, tax on bullets, is IN PLACE but the tax is not high enough to eliminate shooting YET.

 

All I am saying is that the enumerated freedoms of the constitution should be 100% tax free at both state and national levels.  That means sales taxes, vice taxes,  BAFTE fees,  background check fees ... all of it needs to go away.   I don't care if it pays for some "service" ... there is no gun-related service that I require from the government.    It needs to go away.   Ill pay my fair share of taxes on everything else same as always.  But taxing a right opens a door to tax the right OUT OF EXISTENCE.   That is BAD.

Edited May 18, 2015 by Jonnin

[Ray Z]

Taxes, taxes, taxes. The last I heard for every dollar that goes in one side of the government only about 2 cents comes out the other end for services to our nation. No one is there to control how much tax is actually charged. Is it 10% of the cost of the gun, or 10% of the retail cost of the gun? Is there 10% tax on the material, labor, and shipping? Then 10% again on the retail cost of the gun? Do you get my point? Who is to say that our government can't impost another tax of firearms and ammo? The state department tax started out just on what was exported. Now it's on everything associated with firearms.