Comments on: graphics matter

By: walls of the city

walls of the city — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 18:17:59 +0000

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…

By: walls of the city

walls of the city — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 06:48:15 +0000

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…

By: walls of the city

walls of the city — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 18:10:54 +0000

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…

By: Linoge

Linoge — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 11:06:01 +0000

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.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 09:30:34 +0000

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.

By: Linoge

Linoge — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 20:58:34 +0000

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…

By: Billll

Billll — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 23:35:15 +0000

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

By: Linoge

Linoge — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 22:03:39 +0000

As I mentioned in the original post,

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).

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 .

By: John Hardin

John Hardin — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 20:47:42 +0000

…what does the blue dot in 2003 represent?

By: Linoge

Linoge — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 18:15:00 +0000

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…

By: richudson

richudson — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 11:34:24 +0000

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.

By: walls of the city

walls of the city — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 20:42:01 +0000

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…

By: Linoge

Linoge — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 15:05:52 +0000

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.

By: John Hardin

John Hardin — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 14:28:45 +0000

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/

By: walls of the city

walls of the city — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 09:32:11 +0000

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…

By: hsoi

hsoi — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 09:24:37 +0000

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.

By: Linoge

Linoge — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 08:56:57 +0000

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:

Additionally, the number of firearms has been, very slightly, increasing faster than the population.

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.

By: mikeb302000

mikeb302000 — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 06:43:04 +0000

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?

By: Linoge

Linoge — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 23:17:57 +0000

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.
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 . Honestly, I kind of enjoy this kind of tinkering…
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 .) I will think about it, though.
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.

By: John S

John S — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 22:12:32 +0000

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.