Innovations in firearm lethality were driven by sagging gun sales instead of consumer demand.

Evidence

Center, demonstrates that the innovation of firearm lethality was driven by sagging gun sales rather than by consumer demand (Diaz, 1999). Several factors contributed to the stagnating sales of firearms. The shrinkage of rural populations eroded the hunting tradition. Urban youths were not socialized into hunting and sport-shooting activities. Another major problem facing the gun industry is that guns do not wear out, so owners have little need for new purchases. The growth market became mainly city dwellers arming themselves for self-defense, and criminal elements using guns for criminal activities. Andrew Molchan, the editor of a firearms magazine, described the problem of deficient market growth: “Without new models that have major technical changes, you eventually exhaust your market. You get to the point where 90% of the people who might want one have one already” William Ruger, a dominant gun maker, had a solution to stagnating sales-replacement through innovation: “We have a little moneymaking machine here. — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 1019

Categorization

• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm…, 1019