I don't get hunting...

[HereSince1628]

7. Setting aside whether you get it and whether it should be called sport...

Hunting is important to wildlife management and more generally conservation, it's also a significant source of income for some regions of the US.

Firearms & equipment sales are an important source of revenue for wildlife conservations/restoration and the purchase and set-aside of habitat that benefits species well beyond those hunted...

Funds from an 11 percent excise tax on sporting arms and ammunition [Internal Revenue Code of 1954, sec. 4161(b)] are appropriated to the Secretary of the Interior and apportioned to States on a formula basis for paying up to 75 percent of the cost approved projects. Project activities include acquisition and improvement of wildlife habitat, introduction of wildlife into suitable habitat, research into wildlife problems, surveys and inventories of wildlife problems, acquisition and development of access facilities for public use, and hunter education programs, including construction and operation of public target ranges.

Public Law 91-503, approved October 23, 1970, (84 Stat. 1097) added provisions for the deposit of the 10 percent tax on pistols and revolvers, one-half of which may be used by the States for hunter safety programs. This amendment also provided for development of comprehensive fish and wildlife management plans as an optional means for participating in the program, and changed the maximum limit from $10,000 to one-half percent for Puerto Rico and to one-sixth percent for the Virgin Islands and Guam.

On October 25, 1972, the Act was further amended by P.L. 92-558 (86 Stat. 1172) to add provisions for the deposit of the 11-percent excise tax on bows, arrows, and their parts and accessories for use in wildlife projects or hunter safety programs.


Considering just WI, the 9-day gun deer hunt injects $1.3 billion into the economy.

I don't get watching professional basketball, I certainly don't get state and local government giving away public land for sports arenas for one dollar, or subsidizing a billion dollar industry with money from poor tax-payers to build venues where the poor will never be able to afford to attend.

Moreover, the life-span of sports arenas is usually several decades at which time the community has a white elephant on it's hands and must once again reach into it's pockets to recycle the venue.

Yet, I am told 'I don't get it' that such things really are good for the economy in general (even though they mostly seem to go to real estate value and retail rental) and -must- go forward whether I get it or not.