Originally posted by beet1e
Don't you have to pay for it or anything?
[/b]
All must have a "general" State hunting license...this is an "over the counter" affair that is merely revenue collection to fund the State Fish and Game agencies. There's no test or qualification per se. Most states also require a "deer tag" which is merely more revenue collection.
For example a Kansas resident would pay $19.75 for his annual hunting license. Non-residents get gouged a bit more. The deer tag is $31. So, call it about $50 to hunt deer during the ~ three week season.
Last year Kansas had 92,141 total deer hunters (82,885 residents; 9,256 nonresidents). 73.000 deer were taken.
Much (most?) of this is on "no charge" public hunting land. We have State and Federal land such as that around resevoirs that is open to free hunting. In Kansas this is on the order of 300,000 acres. Kansas (and most other midwest states) has adopte the "Walk-In" hunting program, where land is leased from farmers to allow public hunting. You just can't drive on the land in a vehicle. (This is one place those license fees go). In Kansas, there nearly 1 million acres of this. Beyond that, the majority of farmers will let you hunt for free if you are presentable and know how to ask in a polite, reasonable manner.
Kansas is not exceptional in these numbers. Nebraska, South Dakota, etc. are similar. Last year Nebraska sold 112,563 deer permits. Iowa sold 216,162. South Dakota sold 100,482. Texas sold almost 1 million deer permits; 999,787.
So, as you can see our hunting tradition features strongly in the number of firearms here. It's something England really doesn't have due to the way Game was "owned" and used throughout your history.
On sharp instruments, I see you've gone back to your old trickery of quoting percentages when referring to British stats,
[/b]
No, you miss the argument.
Your homicide rates per 100,000 have remained essentially the same both before and after the ban. In other words, the annual rates for say 1994, 1995, 1996 and 1997 are amazingly close to the rates for 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002.
So while you banned handguns, semi-auto and pump rifles and shotguns your homicides per 100K remained about the same before and after the ban.
So, with all these guns removed from the dangerous hands of the public, how did the people die in order to keep the homicide rate about the same?
Most likely, and right now I don't have time for a stat check, the gun homicide rate hasn't dropped all that much. Your handgun homicides are already done with illegally held guns anyway. But, to make up for any drop in gun homicides there are.....
Sharp instruments. Obviously, you've got about the same amount of homicide. They had to be killed with something, and stats show sharp instrument killings are up significantly.
So, the question remains if you pick up all the handguns will killers merely switch to something else, like sharp instruments? The jury is really still out on that, but the experience in England suggests that might be the case.
Now, I'm off. Driving to Houston to see the docs at MD Anderson and get this thing out. Ta.
Oh... one other thing. You seem to focus on "posters" rather than "readers".
As I said before, I'll let the
readers decide for themselves.
