Fewer Guns, Less Homicide?

The United States has a much higher homicide rate than just about any other highly developed country, and it also has much more civilian gun ownership. Further, within the U.S., the simplest analysis — the type journalists can do, using data that are readily available online — reveals tight correlations between states’ gun deaths and factors such as gun ownership and gun-control laws. The obvious conclusion seems to be: Get rid of the guns, get rid of the violence. It’s that simple, everyone knows it, and yet redneck conservatives in thrall to the NRA stubbornly resist handing over their weapons.

That’s a seductive line of reasoning — especially in the wake of horrifying, high-profile incidents such as the recent mass shooting in Colorado Springs — but it’s false. In fact, the United States’ overall high rate of homicide is largely explained, perhaps entirely explained, by problems unrelated to gun ownership. There are policies concerning gun ownership that could reduce homicide, but the reductions would most likely be modest.