Gun Culture 2.0: The Evolution and Contours of Defensive Gun Ownership in America

Predicting Gun Ownership in America: Birth Cohort, Political Views, and Attitudes Towards Gun Control Legislation

Reducing gun violence in America.

The rate of gun violence in the United States substantially exceeds that of most other developed nations (1). Within the United States, gun deaths— particularly homicides—contribute to disparities in life expectancy between whites and minority groups, particularly African-Americans (2). Scientific progress in understanding how to address this problem has been limited in part because of limited ...

The social costs of gun ownership

This paper provides new estimates of the effect of household gun prevalence on homicide rates, and infers the marginal external cost of handgun ownership. The estimates utilize a superior proxy for gun prevalence, the percentage of suicides committed with a gun, which we validate. Using countyand state-level panels for 20 years, we estimate the elasticity of homicide with respect to gun prevale...

Gun ownership and firearm-related deaths.

BACKGROUND A variety of claims about possible associations between gun ownership rates, mental illness burden, and the risk of firearm-related deaths have been put forward. However, systematic data on this issue among various countries remain scant. Our objective was to assess whether the popular notion "guns make a nation safer" has any merits. METHODS Data on gun ownership were obtained fro...

The Effects of Gun Ownership Rates and Gun Control Laws on Suicide Rates

The purpose of the present study is to determine the effects of gun control laws and gun ownership rates on state-level suicide rates. Using the most recent data on suicide rates, gun control measures, and gun ownership rates, the results of the present study suggest that states that require handgun permits have lower gun-related suicide rates, and states that have higher gun ownership rates ha...