If you take the 3.2M firearm estimate and the 1996 Census data indicating a population of ~18.3M, you end up with around 7 guns per 40 Australians; the American population as of 4 July 2015 was ~320,000,000, and using the 8-year-old firearm data, you'd end up with about 84 guns per 100 Americans. That would put the current American gun per capita rate at ~480% of Australia's at the time of its gun confiscation ("mandatory buyback") program.
At the time, somewhere around 3.2 million guns were in circulation, indicating that ~1/3 of firearms in stock were confiscated/destroyed. To achieve this in America, around 90 million firearms would have to be seized if the ~270 million firearm estimate is to be believed.
If you take the 3.2M firearm estimate and the 1996 Census data indicating a population of ~18.3M, you end up with around 7 guns per 40 Australians; the American population as of 4 July 2015 was ~320,000,000, and using the 8-year-old firearm data, you'd end up with about 84 guns per 100 Americans. That would put the current American gun per capita rate at ~480% of Australia's at the time of its gun confiscation ("mandatory buyback") program.
Seems like current estimations of guns are at 300 million, according to MAIG and NRA. Trying to get firearms out of the US is a fools errand.
Wow thank you for such an in-depth answer and research!