Economics

Chicago wants to stop Glock pistols being turned into machineguns

Published

12 months ago

March 31, 2024

Business Finance News

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“THAT PUNK pulled a Glock,” says Bruce Willis’s character in the action-packed 1990s Christmas classic “Die Hard 2”. “You know what that is?” You may well do. That gun on the hip of a police officer? It’s probably a pistol made by Glock, an Austrian manufacturer. That weapon in John Wick’s hands during a heart-thumping scene? One of them is definitely a Glock. From law enforcement to Hollywood lawbreakers, Glocks are everywhere in pop culture. They are also the gun of choice for real-life criminals. Which makes the fact that they can so easily be turned into machineguns that much more worrying.

On March 19th the city of Chicago filed a lawsuit against Glock. Using cheap add-ons, criminals are transforming Glock pistols into machineguns. The illegal device is called an auto sear, but it is also known as a “Glock switch”, though Glock does not make them. They are the size of a large coin, and they can be bought for less than a hardback book, or made at home by anyone with a 3D printer for much less.

The lawsuit, filed together with Everytown Law, a group of litigators specialising in gun reform, claims that Glock knows about the problem but has failed to prevent it anyway. “No other pistol design is so easily converted to a machinegun,” says Eric Tirschwell, the executive director of Everytown Law. “So why haven’t they fixed theirs?”

Chicago is notorious for its street violence, and the pandemic only made things worse. Though shootings fell by 13% in 2023 compared with 2022, the city is still facing a wave of gun violence. Last year more than 600 people were murdered, though not all by guns, and there were over 2,400 non-fatal shootings. The city of Chicago claims that Glock is making a bad situation worse. The lawsuit states that between 2021 and 2023, 1,100 modified Glocks were recovered by Chicago’s police.

The National Rifle Association, America’s gun lobby, disagrees with blaming Glock. “Chicago’s focus ought to be on the criminals,” says Andrew Arulanandam, the group’s interim CEO. “Without criminals, there is less crime.”

The Windy City is not alone in facing a barrage of bullets. The District of Columbia and others have also reported problems with these illegal add-ons. Chicago is the first city to sue over the devices. The lawsuit is made possible by the Illinois Firearms Industry Responsibility Act, a state law passed last year that allows gun manufacturers to be sued for public harm, but it also rests on a federal law prohibiting machineguns. This suit may be the first of its kind, but it probably won’t be the last. ■

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Economics

Tariffs to spike inflation, stunt growth and raise recession risks, Goldman says

Published

7 hours ago

March 30, 2025

Business Finance News

U.S. President Donald Trump announces that his administration has reached a deal with elite law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom during a swearing-in ceremony in the Oval Office at the White House on March 28, 2025 in Washington, DC.

Andrew Harnik | Getty Images

With decision day looming this week for President Donald Trump’s latest round of tariffs, Goldman Sachs expects aggressive duties from the White House to raise inflation and unemployment and drag economic growth to a near-standstill.

The investment bank now expects that tariff rates will jump 15 percentage points, its previous “risk-case” scenario that now appears more likely when Trump announces reciprocal tariffs on Wednesday. However, Goldman did note that product and country exclusions eventually will pull that increase down to 9 percentage points.

When the new trade moves are enacted, the Goldman economic team led by head of global investment research Jan Hatzius sees a broad, negative impact on the economy.

In a note published on Sunday, the firm said “we continue to believe the risk from April 2 tariffs is greater than many market participants have previously assumed.”

Inflation above goal

On inflation, the firm sees its preferred core measure, excluding food and energy prices, to hit 3.5% in 2025, a 0.5 percentage point increase from the prior forecast and well above the Federal Reserve’s 2% goal.

That in turn will come with weak economic growth: Just a 0.2% annualized growth rate in the first quarter and 1% for the full year when measured from the fourth quarter of 2024 to Q4 of 2025, down 0.5 percentage point from the prior forecast. In addition, the Wall Street firm now sees unemployment hitting 4.5%, a 0.3 percentage point raise from the previous forecast.

Taken together, Goldman now expects a 35% chance of recession in the next 12 months, up from 20% in the prior outlook.

The forecast paints a growing chance of a stagflation economy, with low growth and high inflation. The last time the U.S. saw stagflation was in the late 1970s and early ’80s. Back then, the Paul Volcker-led Fed dramatically raised interest rates, sending the economy into recession as the central bank chose fighting inflation over supporting economic growth.

Three rate cuts

Goldman’s economists do not see that being the case this time. In fact, the firm now expects the Fed to cut its benchmark rate three times this year, assuming quarter percentage point increments, up from a previous projection of two rate cuts.

“We have pulled the lone 2026 cut in our Fed forecast forward into 2025 and now expect three consecutive cuts this year in July, September, and November, which would leave our terminal rate forecast unchanged at 3.5%-3.75%,” the Goldman economists said, referring to the fed funds rate, down from 4.25% to 4.50% today.

Though the extent of the latest tariffs is still not known, the Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that Trump is pushing his team toward more aggressive levies that could mean an across-the-board hit of 20% to U.S. trading partners.

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Economics

DOGE comes for the data wonks

Published

21 hours ago

March 30, 2025

Business Finance News

FOR NEARLY three decades the federal government has painstakingly surveyed tens of thousands of Americans each year about their health. Door-knockers collect data on the financial toll of chronic conditions like obesity and asthma, and probe the exact doses of medications sufferers take. The result, known as the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS), is the single most comprehensive, nationally representative portrait of American health care, a balkanised and unwieldy $5trn industry that accounts for some 17% of GDP.