Posted on 06/29/2022 3:01:57 AM PDT by Paladin2
Montana leads the nation in gun ownership, a new study by the personal finance website WalletHub found.
Montana's gun ownership rate is 65%, and the state also ranks fifth in the study for its "dependency on the gun industry," which the website measured using three dimensions (firearms industry, gun prevalence and gun politics) and 16 metrics.
Gary Marbut, president of the Montana Shooting Sports Association, is not surprised by the state's ranking, he told The Center Square.
The group estimates that 90%-95% of the homes in Montana contain firearms, Marbut said, with hunting being one reason for that high percentage.
"There are people who live in Montana just for the hunting," he said. "In the fall, there is deer and elk hunting. In other times of the year, there is bear and mountain lion hunting, moose hunting, sheep, goats, game bird and waterfowl hunting. When none of those is in season, there is always gopher hunting and prairie dog hunting, coyote hunting and other kinds of hunting of unregulated species."
Marbut added that the state also has a very strong competitive shooting community.
"There are all kinds of shooting communities," he said. "There is bullseye and high power, smallbore, long range, metallic silhouette, trap and skit, sporting clays, practical pistol and long-range precision rifle and others."
Then there are the "plunkers," who just like to go out and shoot at tin cans or go to the firing range and shoot at paper targets, according to Marbut.
Self defense is also a major factor in gun ownership in Montana, he added.
"They just want to be able to choose whether or not be victims," Marbut said. "You put all of that together and there are a lot of reasons why people in Montana own firearms."
The state has a low rate of mass shootings and gun violence, Jill Gonzalez, analyst and attorney for WalletHub, told KGVO.
“We actually did a correlation here in terms of the state dependency on the gun industry versus the number of mass shootings,” she told KGVO. “And Montana is one of the states where you do see a high dependency on the industry with relatively low mass shooting numbers, and that's the same with states like Idaho, Wyoming and South Dakota, so that number does look pretty good here.”
What lots of people in government don’t realize, huge portions of the country are not covered by local police. Where we live, there is only State Police. You have a fender bender and need a police report for insurance, you would wait hours for someone to show up. This isn’t a knock on state cops, they have more important things to do.
You call 911 in the burbs, cops would be there in 3 minutes. This provides folks with the illusion on safety. Rural America, you better be armed.
“Where we live, there is only State Police.”
Every County doesn’t have a Sheriff [with staff]?
North Carolina needs to up its game.
Someone told me once that the two most important tools one can have when living way out of town is a firearm and a backhoe. Something about keeping the flies down until help arrives.
“trap and skit”
“plunkers”
Makes you wonder about the author or editor.
Plinker!
The author comes off as a plonker.
It’s become difficult to find good help.
Take 0bama, please....
Hmm lots of guns, and very little violence.
What are Montana’s demographics like?
I’m doing my best. I just bought a Star BM and a Star Firestar last weekend. That crosses two more off my list.
"Montana leads nation in KNOWN gun ownership rate"
I do know that there are likely still muskets in some homes in Whiskey Rebellion Country....
I believe that the BATFE thinks that those old tools are not firearms.
Define gun....
Damn, Idaho needs to up our game.
No... It can’t be true... No mass shootings.... 🤓
Of all the folks I’ve met in the time I’ve lived in WV (20 yrs) I can only think of two households that may...MAY... not have possessed firearms. Even the “little old ladies” had at least a hog leg.
Of course unlike those at WalletHub, I did NOT go around asking folks if they had weapons.
Idaho has some catching up to do.
"I'm not an armorer!"
Then there are the “plunkers,” who just like to go out and shoot at tin cans
= = =
Using Howitzers?
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