At the same time though your average newby also isnt purchasing a 22lr for a LOT of reasons.....many/most of which are ego related
Most buyers of 22lr are folks that have owned firearms for years and are experienced enough to realize that you can have a lot of fun/can do same training/practice in most cases with rimfire as you can with centerfire
Uhh- not sure if serious- everyone and their brothers uncle tells new shooters to "buy a 22" (and many do) and the skinflint attraction for a 22 to Johnny 1-4 box types is undeniable. Yeah, the idiot that buys his one .40 S&W gun shop commando gun ain't buying them, but if I asked new shooters,
that owned more than one gun, but had less than 5 years experience what the first 6 guns they bought were, I would bet that a huge part of the time there's at least one .22 LR on the list. Hell even I sucked for that bullshit years ago, I think I had bought my Ruger MKII within like 4 months of getting my LTC.
Also to further reinforce my point- we didn't hit a serious hard core .22 LR drought until Sandy Hook and the attendant explosion of new gun owners that came along
after it. These were the people gobbling up the 22 LR, not so much established gun owners, less likely to overpay for that shit. The rest of us were still trying to
get over the fact that the stuff wasn't $8 for 550 rounds anymore.
I've lost track of the number of newb types I've seen at the range with M&P 15-22s, that kind of thing, as well as Walther P22, and others. And the number of newbs buying 22LR at gun shows, etc.
-Mike