It appears that violent crime is down in the US--not what the Commentariat would have us expect. Its rationale for rising crime has always been bad social or civil conditions, such as poverty, discrimination, and unemployment. Therefore, if the standard blah is correct, given the numbers of people unemployed and the rising poverty in the United States, we would expect soaring crime rates.
It's not happening. Why? Crime rates have complex causes. There is no one single factor. Emily Miller, in the article below, makes the case that one reason crime may have been restrained and reduced is rising gun ownership. That may or may not be the case--since mere co-incidence of two conditions does not prove causality.
But, it does call into question a causality long championed by the Commentariat: it has been argued repeatedly that high levels of gun ownership cause more violent crimes to occur.
Think: "the more households owning guns will result in more deaths from domestic disputes." Intuitive, right? But, if that were true, the rapid increase in gun ownership in the United States over the past eight years should have produced more violent crime. It hasn't. Therefore, the causality between gun ownership and crime is looking increasingly shaky.
FBI violent-crime rates show safer nation with more gun owners
By Emily Miller
The Washington Times
Monday, June 18, 2012
Gun-control advocates are noticeably silent when crime rates decline. Their multimillion-dollar lobbying efforts are designed to manufacture mass anxiety that every gun owner is a potential killer. The statistics show otherwise.
Last week, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) announced that violent crime decreased 4 percent in 2011. The number of murders, rapes, robberies and aggravated assaults all went down, continuing a pattern. "This is not a one-year anomaly, but a steady decline in the FBI's violent-crime rates," said Andrew Arulanandam, spokesman for the National Rifle Association. "It would be disingenuous for anyone to not credit increased self-defense laws to account for this decline."
Mr. Arulanandam pointed out that only a handful of states had concealed-carry programs 25 years ago, when the violent-crime rate peaked. Today, 41 states either allow carrying without a permit or have "shall issue" laws that make it easy for just about any noncriminal to get a permit. Illinois and Washington, D.C., are the only places that refuse to recognize the right to bear arms. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence did not respond to requests for comment. . . .
The FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) serves as one of the best indicators of gun sales because it counts each time someone buys a gun. Checks hit an all-time high of 16.5 million last year. In the first five months of this year, the numbers have gone up 10 percent over the same period last year as Americans rush to the gun store in case President Obama decides to exercise "more flexibility" in restricting guns in a second term. . . .
Last month, Smith & Wesson announced a firearm-order backlog of approximately $439 million by the end of April, up 135 percent from the same quarter in 2011. Sales in that period were up 28 percent from 2011 and 14 percent over its own predictions to investors. NSSF estimates the industry is responsible for approximately 180,000 jobs and has an annual impact on the U.S. economy of $28 billion. . . .
Emily Miller is a senior editor for the Opinion pages at The Washington Times.
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