From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@datamann.com)
Date: Thu Jan 03 2002 - 14:35:58 MST
Patrick Wilken wrote:
>
> >From: James Rogers
> >
>
> >It should also be noted that virtually all of the concentrations of violent
> >crime in the US occur in locales where firearms have been banned or severely
> >restricted.
>
> Again this is just an argument from correlation. Is there any
> evidence that is more convincing? I realise that this sort of
> evidence is hard to come by.
It isn't hard to come by. The FBI publishes crime data on every
jurisdiction in the US every year, which you can access via it's
website. John Lott's research was based on this data, the first study of
its kind (anti- gunners generally prefer to cherry pick a few counties
here and there that fit their preconceptions). He found that:
a) making it easier for law abiding private citizens to carry concealed
weapons results in an average of 8% drops in violent crime (this number
was later increased to 12% by a study of the same data with more
accurate statistical methods by an independent group of researchers).
b) doing the above reduces the incidence of multiple shootings by 80%
c) for every 1% increase in CCW permit issuance, violent crime drops by
2%.
His findings were published in his book "More Guns, Less Crime" by the
University of Chicago Press. Professor Lott sat on the Olin Chair of
Economics at the U of Chi School of Economics at the time, and is now on
the faculty of Yale University. (
http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcdgcon.html )
The independent study I spoke of can be found here:
Plus a 1999 follow-up paper on multiple shootings, bombings, etc by Lott
and Landes:
http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcdgcon.html
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