The state of Connecticut is proving that restrictive firearms laws don’t just affect gun owners.

According to the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), Connecticut’s economy dropped $700 million over a three-year period because of new restrictive gun laws pushed by Gov. Dannel Malloy and lawmakers.

Approximately 3,000 jobs were lost in the firearms industry and related fields, a drop of 39 percent from 2013 levels, according to the NSSF.

One of the companies that fled is PTR Industries, which manufactures high-end rifles. Liberal lawmakers predictably called such weapons “assault rifles” while PTR refers to them as “modern sporting rifles,” hence an inevitable conflict erupted when state lawmakers sought more restrictive gun laws after the 2012 Newtown school shooting.

A New York Times story about the company’s planned move (see video below) uses the term “assault rifle” and notes ominously that the company is located “30 miles from Newtown.”

What angered PTR was the Violence Prevention and Children’s Safety Act, which the company described as a bill fraught with “disastrous consequences for the fundamental rights” of Connecticut citizens.

“With a heavy heart but a clear mind,” the company said in an April 2013 statement, “we have been forced to decide that our business can no longer survive in Connecticut – the former Constitution state.”

The company moved to the “gun-friendly” state of South Carolina, recalls Eric Scheiner of Media Research Center TV, which has followed the firearms debate in Connecticut.

At the time numerous media outlets were reporting that firearms manufacturers, and accessory and magazine makers, were being courted by South Carolina, Texas and other states that were observing the conflict with state lawmakers in New York, Colorado, Maryland, and Connecticut.

Media were also reporting at the time that Connecticut citizens were angered by the new state law. When a deadline came on Jan. 1, 2014 to register semi-auto rifles, only 15 percent of gun owners complied with the law, risking a felony for doing so.

Scheiner suspects that states with less-restrictive gun laws are aware of the economic impact in states such as Connecticut.

“Also,” he adds, “if you’re in a state that’s considering maybe increasing or passing new gun laws and you find out that your state has a lot of firearms-related or ammunition-related industries, you may want to look at the possible economic impact and speak to your elected representative before that bill is voted upon.”

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Copyright American Family News. Reprinted with permission.

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