Per Capita Firearms vs Murder Rates in the U.S. 1950 – 2014

ammoland ^ | 22 August, 2016 | Dean Weingarten

[marktwain]

While various pundits and scholars have claimed that more guns equal more murders, the raw numbers reveal that to be untrue.  The graph above plots the per capita firearms rate in the United States (stated as number of firearms per 10 people) against the murder rate as tabulated in the FBI Uniform Crime Reports (UCR).  The UCR includes both murder and non-negligent homicide in the murder numbers.  The UCR murder rate is per 100,000 people in the United States.

The murder rate may be one of the most reliable numbers in the UCR, because murders are more likely to be reported than any other crime.  There is a body, and usually an investigation.  Other crime numbers are less certain. I have not found numbers for the UCR murder rate from 1945 to 1950, but a source, “Violence in America”, by Gurr, states that the rate was fairly steady at about 5.8 per 100,000 in the 40s. The numbers could be measured from the next graph, but it would involve some measurement error. If the 45-49 numbers become available, I will use them in an updated chart.

Using the 65 years of data on the chart, the calculated correlation coefficient is a negative .1274, showing essentially no correlation.

The per capita firearms rate builds on work done by Newton and Zimring, then Gary Kleck. From 1950 to 1987, the data was taken from “Point Blank: Guns and Violence in America” by Gary Kleck, Table 2.1.

The methodology used by Newton and Zimring, and then Kleck,was applied to the figures obtained from the ATF for later years.  The number shown is the cumulative addition of domestic manufacture plus imports minus exports.  This does not count guns shipped to the U.S. military. 

[marktwain]

The number of guns owned privately has little to do with the number of murders. The number of guns carried may reduce the number of murders.

[Fido969]

Murders are a function of the number of community organizers.

[thefactor]

This has more to do with Roe V. Wade than anything else. Whether you agree with that decision or not doesn’t matter.

[pepsionice]

I think the one key thing that could be shown if you did the right chart....is the relationship between urban areas (200,000-plus people) versus lesser areas versus rural areas. If you put the murder listing up....the bulk of murders since the late 1960s (I think) would show up in the top forty cities of the US.

You can go to some areas of Alabama (not Birmingham) and find maybe an average of just five murders over a ten-year period.

[Yashcheritsiy]

Honestly, it looks like per capita murders correlate better with social revolution, not gun ownership.

[indthkr]

2nd Amendment bump for later....

[Theoria]

There are numerous factors into play. The murder rate should also realize the advancement in emergency medical care in response to bullet trauma.

[Theoria]

And work displacement, ie manufacturing offshore.

[FirstFlaBn]

It would be interesting to see murders broken out by race if good data is available across the entire date range.

I had a friend who became a cop in a fairly large Deep South city in 1967. Black population about 22%. He retired in 1992. When we first met I asked him whether the following was true: When you started in ‘67, the ER at the county hospital (where the uninsured went) on Saturday night was populated with young black males suffering from stab wounds; twenty five years later (1992), that same ER on a Saturday night was filled with young black males suffering from gunshot wounds.

He answered with one word: Yep.

Upward mobility means pistols instead of kitchen knives.

[harpu]

Just sent the chart and the detail out to my extended emailing list!! Thank you for posting.

[Red Badger]

An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life........Robert A. Heinlein

[marktwain]

Thank you. It would be nice if attribution to Gun Watch could be sent.

http://gunwatch.blogspot.com/2016/07/per-capita-firearms-vs-murder-rates-in.html

[Be Free]

Just for fun, show this graph to a liberal - but without the labels. Tell them the “red” is % of vehicles with airbags, and green is the number of vehicular deaths per 100,000 vehicles. Then ask them what they think the graph tells them.

Only after they’ve answered, tell them it is gun ownership and deaths by firearms. Then ask them what they think the graph tells them.

Then stand back and watch their head explode!

[PROCON]

An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life........Robert A. Heinlein

Thanks for the reminder, Red Badger!

Thanks Dean!

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[Sam Gamgee]

Frankly I’m still stuck on the stat of gun ownership. The highest on record.

[GailA]

Least we forget
Medical Malpractice
http://www.medicalmalpracticelawyer.center/2014/05/new-study-confirms-440000-deat.html

Parole and Probation
https://www.ncjrs.gov/txtfiles/ppvsp91.txt

Black on black Murder
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2013/crime-in-the-u.s.-2013/offenses-known-to-law-enforcement/expanded-homicide/expanded_homicide_data_table_6_murder_race_and_sex_of_vicitm_by_race_and_sex_of_offender_2013.xls#disablemobile

Top 10 causes of deaths in the US
http://www.statisticbrain.com/leading-causes-of-death-in-the-u-s/

Recidivism
http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=17

http://www.nij.gov/topics/corrections/recidivism/pages/welcome.aspx

https://www.ncjrs.gov/app/topics/Topic.aspx?topicid=20

[Molon Labbie]

Folks, UCR stats are derived from police department participation. It is voluntary.

A full quarter of all police departments in the US do not participate.

So, we really do not have accurate numbers.

[marktwain]

Very few numbers are completely accurate.

But the FBI does extrapolate the numbers from the reports they get to the rest of the country.

[harpu]

I did send along that attribution without the link...

[TXnMA]

I copied the chart over into my "workhorse" graphics program, so I could draw some "matching lines".

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In 2006, we reached a gun count of one (1) gun for every American -- and we're still buying them at ever-increasing rates!

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Also, I did some research on when that sharp drop in murders began. It coincides with the 1994 Clinton "Assault Weapons Ban" -- which was also the start of the NRA's big push for concealed carry and better firearms law enforcement.

The end of the (10-year) AWB had no noticeable effect on murder rate. Gun ownership increased at a steady, linear ~0.8/year rate during the ban -- but, when the AWB ended, gun ownership began increasing geometrically! (Guess you could call that a "genuine stimulus bill"...) LOL!

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Also, the 2014 murder rate was the lowest in 50 years (since 1964)...

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...lots of stuff to blow the minds of hoplophobes... '-)

I'd say we've got 'em on the run, folks! :-)

Thanks for posting this!!