Are Guns Declining?

The New York Sun ^ | March 10, 2013 | Masthead Editorial

[neverdem]

News that the share of American homes with guns has been declining for four decades is best seen as a wake-up call to those who believe in the original principles of the American compact. The New York Times is fronting the news based on data from the General Social Survey, which is a data collection operation based at the Chicago University. The Times’ analysis of its data suggests that gun ownership has, as the Times puts it, “fallen across a broad cross section of households since the early 1970s” in cities and rural areas and all regions of the country. What it calls the “household gun ownership rate” has plunged to 34% in 2012 from more than 50% in the 1970s.

This plunge is a shocking and dangerous development in a nation whose system of government was framed on an understanding that widespread, private gun ownership was one of the struts of liberty. The dispatch in the Times, a shrewdly crafted scoop, notes that the findings “contrast with the impression left by a flurry of news reports about people rushing to buy guns and clearing shop shelves of assault rifles after the massacre last year at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.” It reckons the declining ownership rate “suggests that even as the conversation on guns remains contentious...”

--snip--

In any event, the Times reports that the trend “raises questions about the future politics of gun control.” The way it poses the question is this: “Will efforts to regulate guns eventually meet with less resistance if they are increasingly concentrated in fewer hands — or more resistance?” By our lights it’s a good question, one that invites a reconsideration of the strategy being pursued by those of us who believe that the Second Amendment is the “palladium” of our liberty...

[clearcarbon]

"BS meter alert! Maybe gun owners are just less inclined to tell people what they own."

I suppose they didn't even bother to try counting guns owned by trespassing foreign nationals.

[Graybeard58]

This is total BS anti-gun propaganda. The only place where gun ownership is declining is in the states that illegally ban law-abiding citizens from owning them.

Here in Illinois we are "allowed" to own guns, just not carry them. Visit this place some time:

Pekin Gun and Sporting Goods 281 Derby St Pekin, IL. (309) 347-6060

Be prepared to park on the street as the parking lot is always jammed full and has been that way since zero's first election.

I bought a pistol there about 5 years ago, it's a good sized place but was literally packed with customers.

[Jet Jaguar]

There she is again.

I am transfixed...

[Washi]

Who here would tell a pollster the truth about whether or not they owned guns?

[gleeaikin]

I’ve been getting 2 or 3 of these calls a week recently. When I talk to them and try to find out who they are, they hand up on me. Anyone know how to actually catch these guys to report them?

[neverdem]

S.E. Cupp, CPAC, and Homosexuals

Arab Spring, Warmist Spin - Is global warming destabilizing the Middle East? (Robert Zubrin)

Why Do People Believe Scientifically Untrue Things? Because to do otherwise would be immoral.

Morbid find suggests murder-obsessed gunman Adam Lanza plotted Newtown, Conn.'s Sandy Hook massacre for years

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[Gator113]

DRINKMOREOVALTINE

[FreedomPoster]

“Ann” and the people she works for should die in a fire.

Proof of the worthlessness of the no-call list and enforcement thereof.

[Chode]

glad i could help your day... 8^)

[DaveA37]

Brainwashing our children AGAINST guns starts early in their education process. The day will soon be upon us when the population firmly believes that “Guns are Evil”. (It is getting very close). I do believe the day will come when we no longer will be allowed to own guns for that very reason.

[TalonDJ]

Heh, look at that... a MASSIVE drop between ‘93 and ‘95.... what could that mean /sarc
It is pretty damn obvious that right after they passed the first AWB people were MUCH less inclined to fess up on a survey. I am betting the actual ownership level is WAY over 50% it is probably well over 60%

[Fresh Wind]

I wonder whether the statistics on boating accidents have risen as much as gun ownership has declined?

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[Lee N. Field]

A couple points that will skew the numbers:

1) We have more "households" now, what with all the new ways people can live. Singles, single parents etc.

2) Most importantly, who in their right mind tells the truth to a random pollster asking about guns in your house?

After the last election, every single person at work that didn't already have an Ill-i-noise FOID, put in for one. Every single one. I know two people have already acquired firearms. ("Show and tell!")

[TigersEye]

I believe you are absolutely right. Just think, even if 47% were the actual number that would be about 148 million gun owners not the measly 80 million that is often quoted. They can molon lave for the next two hundred years and there will still be a rifle behind every blade of grass.

[Chode]

i think there will be blood in the streets before that happens

[Cyber Liberty]

I’d never lie to a pollster. /s

[Condor51]

Well there you have it.
If it's in the NY Slimes it must be true.