Since 2000, 19 states have relaxed their fireworks laws, and Florida is one of them. In 2020, the state finally made it legal for people over the age of 18 to set off fireworks on the Fourth of July, New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day. The previous laws forbidding fireworks had always been loosely enforced anyway. (Lawmakers considered adding Memorial Day to the list but dropped that idea due to wildfire risk during Florida’s dry season.)
The national trend is toward deregulation. One reason: States didn’t like losing tax revenue when their residents crossed state lines to buy fireworks in neighboring states with more lenient laws.
“Florida’s law has been kind of a real oddball for a number of years, initially saying you could only purchase them for pest control purposes,” says July Heckman, executive director of the American Pyrotechnics Association. To buy fireworks in Florida, you used to have to sign a form claiming you were only going to use them to scare birds away from your crops or fish hatcheries. Today, Florida is the only state that has specific fireworks holidays, while some other states have permitted “selling periods” before major holidays, or they have “discharge periods,” for instance, giving residents about a week before July 4.
Fireworks usage has nearly doubled since 2019 and has quadrupled since 2000, according to the Pyrotechnics Association. “When you look at the growth of the industry, it’s phenomenal,” Heckman says. “Prepandemic, in 2019 the consumer firework industry was a $1 billion industry. And in 2022 it was $2.3 billion. It almost doubled in 2020 because there was absolutely nothing else you could do. People started buying fireworks and they didn’t stop.”
Fireworks in America today
- 436 million Pounds of consumer fireworks sold per year
- $2.3 billion Annual revenue from consumer fireworks
- 10,200 People treated in ERs for fireworks injuries
- 11 Fireworks-related deaths
- 73% Percentage of injuries occurring in the weeks before and after July 4
Sources: American Pyrotechnics Association, U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. All figures are for 2022.