A few days ago, I demonstrated that the hypothesis of “more guns equal more deaths” is false, according to numbers accumulated by the CDC and BATFE. However, at the time, I presented that information in a text-heavy, long-winded post, and realized a short, sweet, simple summary might be appreciated by some folks (especially when attempting to use that information against hoplophobes and other anti-rights advocates).
As such, I would like to present you with this handy-dandy graph:
(Click to big-ize.)
[0914 01AUG09 Update] At Yu-Ain Gonnano’s suggestion, I have added a sixth line to the graphic, documenting the numbers of firearms per 10,000 people in America. As you can plainly see, that ration has obviously increased over the past 25 years. Additionally, at Robert’s suggestion, I have also added pointers to each of the major, federal firearm-related laws passed in the recent 25 years – if I missed any, please let me know. One important thing to keep in mind is that there is no evidence indicating that the Assault Weapon Ban decreased crime, and there is no evidence that the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act decreased crime either. In fact, some recent research about the overall crime-decline in the 1990s does not even mention either of those two laws. [/Update]
[1215 01AUG09 Update] At Roberta X’s suggestion, I added a bar graph tracking the number of states with “shall-issue” permit laws. The bar graph should be relatively straightforward, and its only anomaly are the two leaders-of-the-pack: Washington (which allowed for “shall-issue” permits in 1961), and Vermont (which never had a permitting process I am aware of). For the sake of simplicity, though, I went ahead counted Vermont and Alaska (which no longer has a permitting process) as “shall-issue” – more or less identical ideas. However, the number of “shall-issue” states correlates interestingly with decreasing crime rates – a useful argument to use against those who would erroneously give the credit to the Brady Act and Assault Weapon Ban.[/Update]
[1515 01AUG09 Update] After talking it over with Better Half, it would appear as though the legend for the green and blue lines would be more-properly written as “… ( /10,000)” as opposed to “… (x 10,000)”. This change has been made to the legend. Additionally, each individual line now has a description/name driectly above it, so you do not have to keep referencing the legend while you look at the graph.[/Update]
There are a few things to keep in mind when viewing it, however.
1. Fitting it all together: I had to fiddle with orders of magnitude to get all of the lines visible within the same general range, so ups-and-downs did not get minimized. This does not affect the accuracy of the data, it just moves lines around such that you can show them all on the same graph (so you can see the trending of various lines easier). Both the “American Population” line and the “Number of Firearms” line must be multiplied by 10,000 to give their “real” numbers. Additionally, the both forms of the “Rate of Firearm-Related Deaths” are presented in “X per 100,000,000″. Again, this change does not affect the accuracy of the information presented (especially since I kept all the digits of each relevant data point, despite moving those numbers’ decimal points around). The important thing on this graph is trending, not specific numbers (although once you multiply by the appropriate order of magnitude, the numbers are still correct).
The “Number of Firearm-Related Death” line was not adjusted at all – its numbers are its numbers.
2. Where the numbers come from: The “American Population” and “Number of Firearm-Related Deaths” information came from WISQARS.
The “Number of Firearms” was a little more tricky, though… I used the lower end of the range hypothesized in the Small Arms Survey of 2003 as my 2003 datapoint (as denoted by the large dot on that line). For any years after 2003, I added the BATFE Annual Firearms Manufacturers and Export Report numbers. For the years between 2002 and 1997, I successively subtractved the data from the same BATFE report. For the years between 1996 and 1981, I successively subtracted the data from the Shooting Industry Magazine’s U.S. Firearm Industry Report (Extended).
If I had used the information from the 1997 study (192 million firearms in 1994), the number of firearms in America would be reduced by approximately 13 million each year. If I had used the upper range of the Small Arms Survey, the number of firearms in America would increase by approximately 38 million each year. I consider my choice to be a gracious compromise. However, the “Number of Firearms” data is only as accurate as its base assumptions, and I have no way of verifying if any of the three numbers available are accurate, or any more accurate than any others.
The two “Rate” lines were calculated internally to the spreadsheet that generated this graph (however, the “Rate of Firearm Related Deaths per 100,000,000 People” correlates perfectly to a similar statistic generated by WISQARS (once you factor in that their rate is per 100,000 individuals)).
3. Conclusions: Obviously, both the population of America and the number of firearms in America have been increasing over the past 25 years. Additionally, the number of firearms has been, very slightly, increasing faster than the population.
On the other hand, firearm-related deaths have declined, despite a significant bump in the early 1990s. Those deaths have very slowly started increasing again in the past five years, but at a rate roughly commensurate with the population’s.
And on the third hand, the rate of firearm deaths in relation to both population and number of firearms has been steadily decreasing (with a few bumps, here and there) over the course of the 25 years graphed.
As my previous post mathematically demonstrated, this post graphically demonstrates – the hypothesis that more firearms result in more firearm-related deaths is historically false.
4. Verification: Unlike anti-rights advocates, I have used facts and figures to make my point. Additionally unlike anti-rights advocates, I will make those facts and figures, as well as my methods, publicly available. Feel free to download the spreadsheet (I promise it is clean) and take a look at the numbers for yourselves. If I did something wrong, please correct me. If you can find better counts of the number of firearms in America (or anything else), please provide them. I know that the facts are the only things that matter, again, unlike the anti-rights advocates, and anything that can give us a better look at those facts is something we should pursue.
In closing, feel free to download the graph image and use it to your own purposes – I would, of course, appreciate a link-back, but that almost goes without saying.
related posts:
updating the data | the numbers are out there | how it plays out |
Ha! I was going to ask you to graph the data! You must have read my mind
Awesome!
It’s really nice to see a stake driven through the heart of that particular falsity.
I can predict right now that the antis will focus on the data after 1999/2000, where the “more firearms = more firearms deaths” meme _is_ supported by the data. In fact, they will say that 1993-1999 was anomalous, and that apart from that enormous decline (no doubt due to the AWB) the trendlines _do_ support the proposition.
Remember, they don’t focus on deaths per unit population, where the trends are flat or declining; to support their proposition they focus on _total_ deaths.
Me like!
Very awesome!
A great service to us all.
Thank you!
Turk
Does “Firearms related deaths” include justified homicide? If so then you are being a little too generous to the anti-rights people.
Just a suggestion, but it might help to have a guns/population line as well. It might more easily show that the concentration of gun ownership is also rising.
I was thinking that a marker for any major gun related laws would be an interesting touch as well.
Guns owned by the civilian population is also available from Gary Kleck’s 1997 book “Targeting Guns” in table 3.1 “Size of he US Civilian Gun Stock, 1945-1994.
It already includes the Guns/1000 population data.
Kevin S.: No worries
. I was already planning on graphing the data, it is just that going from two data points to 25 takes a little time, and figuring out how best to portray it all took a little longer.
. Honestly, I kind of enjoy this kind of tinkering…
.) I will think about it, though.
Oh, and on a completely unrelated note, I guess congratulations are in order!
GeekWithA.45: Thanks Geek. Unfortunately, this myth will probably rise from the dead again, especially given that the total death count line is obviously erratic, and if you look at a narrow-enough segment, you can conclude whatever your little heart desires. At least now we have a pretty graphic to club people over the head with.
John Hardin: … And, speaking of, you are absolutely correct. The drop in firearm-related deaths starting in ‘93-’94 closely corresponds with the discussion and implementation of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, and the stabilization of that particular line also comes a year after the federal five-day waiting period expired. The Assault Weapon Ban, as you mentioned, also came into effect in ‘94, though it lasted until ‘04.
While you and I both know that correlation does not equate to causation, I feel certain anti-rights advocates will point to the above two bills as to why we are where we are now. However, even discounting those two bills, neither the raw numbers of firearm-related deaths, nor the rates of the same, closely correlate to the number of firearms in America… and when you look at the whole range of data, the trending becomes obvious. I do wish we had more data, but WISQARS only goes back to ‘81.
And I have no doubt that anti-rights advocates will also focus on the raw numbers of firearm-related deaths, as you mentioned… however, even those numbers have decreased over the past 25 years, and are most assuredly not matching the population or number of firearm growths. No matter if you focus on rates, raw numbers, or trends, the anti-rights advocates’ arguments fail.
DirtCrashr: Thanks!
Turk Turon: No worries
Joe Huffman: The “Firearm Related Deaths” category include “all Intents” of any injury in which the “cause or mechanism” was a firearm, according to WISQARS – “all intents” includes “unintentional”, “suicide”, “homicide”, “legal intervention”, and “undetermined intent”.
As I mentioned in my previous post, I firmly believe that accidental (“unintentional”), suicidal, and police-action-related (“legal intervention”) deaths should not count (and neither should justified homicides, but I am not sure if WISQARS categorizes those as “legal intervention”). However, I wanted to drive the point home that even if you accept anti-rights advocates’ arguments at face value, and count each and every single firearm related-death, their hypothesis that “more guns == more deaths” still comes out to be false.
I am, almost certainly, being more gracious than I should, but it destroys their talking points that much more effectively.
Yu-Ain Gonnano: Good call. I will see what I can do about adding that.
Robert: Hm. That might make the graph a bit too cluttered, though… (And it would take way too much effort, which is the real reason
John S: I will have to see if that table is online anywhere… And, lo and behold, according to Mr. Cramer, Kleck estimated 236,000,000 guns in civilian hands in 1994, well above the other 1994 estimate of 192,000,000 I have. Interesting.
Linoge, Congratulations on a great work. I missed your text version, but this one was about all I could handle anyway.
Like someone mentioned the Assault Weapons Ban and the Brady Background checks law, in spite of what I often hear, played a part in the decline. There are other factors too.
One question I had is about the green and blue lines that run parrallel. Wouldn’t that mean that with respect to the population the number of guns is not increasing? So often I’ve been told that the number of guns is up and crime is down. But according to your own ideas of how these stats should be fairly considered, that doesn’t seem to be true, does it?
MikeB302000: Actually, MikeB, there is absolutely no proof that the Assault Weapon ban affected crime, and, additionally, there is absolutely no proof that the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act affected crime either. Granted, there are some interesting correlations between the number of firearm-related deaths, and those two bills, but you have to remember that a correlation is not equivalent to a causation.
Furthermore, MikeB, if you had bothered to look at the data rather than just the pretty pictures, you would find that the green and blue lines are not parallel. I plan on putting up an image later today that will document the number of firearms per 10,000 people, but I will let you in on some of the data: in 1981 there were 6727 firearms per 10,000 people, and in 2006 there were 8307 firearms per 10,000 people. That does mean that the number of guns, with respect to the population, is increasing. Of course, if you had bothered to read the post that accompanied that pretty picture, you would have read this sentence:
Read for comprehension you do not.
And even if you were right (which you are not), and even if the number of firearms were increasing exactly in step with the American population, crime is still down, indicating no direct connection between firearms and crime.
Sorry, MikeB. Another one of your precious myths got blown out of the water. Get over it already.
Y’all need to read Howard Nemerov’s book “400 Years of Gun Control: Why Isn’t It Working”
If you like Linoge’s numbers and work, you’ll love what Howard did.
updating the data
Just wanted to let everyone know that I updated some of the data available in my graph of American population, firearms, and firearm-related deaths. I added a data set comparing the overall American population against the overall numbers of firearms…
You might find these to be interesting and useful tools for presenting the data:
http://www.simile-widgets.org/timeplot/
http://www.simile-widgets.org/exhibit/
Hsoi: Yet another in a long list of books I have been meaning to read… Bloody “Atlas Shrugged” is killing me…
John Hardin: Those widgets are awesome. It might take me a while to get something for our data up and running, but I will be sure to let you all know if/when I do.
spreading the good word
It seems as though I have a few people to thank for linking to my graph disproving the common myth that “more guns = more deaths” (and its subsequent updates). Suffice to say, that myth is unequivocably false. However, in…
Can you run the Chi Square test and or the T-Test on your data in order to establish statistical significance? At that point (assuming statistical significance is demonstrated) it should be written up prosaically, along with testing methods and sent to particular congressional members, probably including some who are fence sitters.
I certainly can, once I remember how to accurately do so… For all the prob and stat I had to do in college, I have not had to do a whit of it since, and some of it has slipped…
…what does the blue dot in 2003 represent?
As I mentioned in the original post,
In essence, everything else on that line is an extrapolation based off that blue dot, either based on the ATF’s numbers, or on the Shooting Industry Magazine’s numbers. Of course, that said, that particular point is not based on anything better than a UN-funded story that may or may not be accurate. Gotta love guessing
.
A quick peruse of graphical data suggests there is a better correlation between gun deaths and unemployment. This should be no big surprise, as typically when times are tough, crime goes up.
Of course that suggests that this year and next are likely to be bad ones for gun deaths.
Of course a shall issue law may drive the death rate down as criminals seek less dangerous MOs, or up as criminals meet armed victims, who knows.
I got my data here
http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet?request_action=wh&graph_name=LN_cpsbref3
and here
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.geoffdavis.net/dartmouth/policy/papers/html/Unemployment.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.geoffdavis.net/dartmouth/policy/papers/html/market.html&h=217&w=499&sz=5&tbnid=orVWO7XpaPAolM:&tbnh=57&tbnw=130&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dunemployment%2Bgraph&usg=__L7KGPmWcMZcTgWRCHDdD__-sOek=&ei=dkt6SqjCOIuCtgerifjgAQ&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=4&ct=image
Interesting idea, Billl… I will probably leave those numbers out of this particular graph, simply because I am trying to isolate it to “just the guns”, so we do not confuse people trying to muddle out what it means, but those numbers do seem to correlate interestingly. I get the feeling I am going to have to release another edition comparing different sets of data in the future…
Those charts are interesting, but I think the term “firearm related deaths” does not provide enough information. That number may include criminals that died as a result of police action or legal self-defense.
I would like to see the firearm related deaths, further broken down by murders, legal self-defense, police action and accidents. My thought is, that legal self-defense and police action should never be used in a chart, to measure gun violence.
But that is exactly why I chose that metric, Anonymous – when discussing these kinds of things with hoplophobes, anti-rights activists, and other such people, they exhibit a constant desire to count all firearm-related deaths, regardless of whether it was a suicide, an accident, a legal self-defense situation, or police action. As such, I wanted to respond in kind… and I would point out that their argument still fails, even though we give them the benefit of the doubt on numbers.
I agree with you that certain sets of numbers really should not be counted… but if I have to do so to more-effectively destroy an anti-rights argument, then I am willing to hold my nose for a few minutes.
more graphics matter
Remember that cute little chart I made disproving the myth of “more guns = more deaths”? Yeah, Reputo went and showed me how it should have been done… in four separate parts, no less. His conclusion? “Gun control” legislation does…
just a modicum of effort
Both Say Uncle and Joe Huffman point to Alan Korwin questioning just how many firearms there are in America: The lamestream media has been claiming for years and years there are about 200 million guns in America. With about 100…
the truth will always out
I honestly could not bring myself to try and wade through the recent not-really-scientific “study” from the known anti-rights advocate Dr. Garen Wintemute, but BobS did, and made an interesting discovery, straight out of the “study” itself: Americans o…