Guns now more lethal in America than cars

[Adam Reynolds]

Americans and their cars
Bangers v bullets
A gun is now more likely to kill you than a car is
Jan 10th 2015 | NEW YORK | From the print edition

ACCORDING to data gathered by the Centres for Disease Control (CDC), deaths caused by cars in America are in long-term decline. Improved technology, tougher laws and less driving by young people have all led to safer streets and highways. Deaths by guns, though—the great majority suicides, accidents or domestic violence—have been trending slightly upwards. This year, if the trend continues, they will overtake deaths on the roads.

The Centre for American Progress first spotted last February that the lines would intersect. Now, on its reading, new data to the end of 2012 support the view that guns will surpass cars this year as the leading killer of under 25s. Bloomberg Government has gone further. Its compilation of the CDC data in December concluded that guns would be deadlier for all age groups.

Comparing the two national icons, cars and guns, yields “a statistic that really resonates with people”, says Chelsea Parsons, co-author of the report for the Centre for American Progress. Resonance is certainly needed. There are about 320m people in the United States, and nearly as many civilian firearms. And although the actual rate of gun ownership is declining, enthusiasts are keeping up the number in circulation. Black Friday on November 28th kicked off such a shopping spree that the FBI had to carry out 175,000 instant background checks (three checks a second), a record for that day, just for sales covered by the extended Brady Act of 1998, the only serious bit of gun-curbing legislation passed in recent history.

Many sales escape that oversight, however. Everytown for Gun Safety, a movement backed by Mike Bloomberg, a former mayor of New York, has investigated loopholes in online gun sales and found that one in 30 users of Armslist classifieds has a criminal record that forbids them to own firearms. Private reselling of guns draws no attention, unless it crosses state lines.

William Vizzard, a professor of criminal justice at California State University at Sacramento, points out that guns also don’t wear out as fast as cars. “I compare a gun to a hammer or a crowbar,” he says. “Even if you stopped making guns today, you might not see a real change in the number of guns for decades.”

Motor vehicles, because they are operated on government-built roads, have been subject to licensing and registration, in the interests of public safety, for more than a century. But guns are typically kept at home. That private space is shielded by the Fourth Amendment just as “the right to bear arms” is protected by the Second, making government control difficult.

Car technologies and road laws are ever-evolving: in 2014, for example, the National Highways Traffic Safety Administration announced its plan to phase in mandatory rear-view cameras on new light vehicles, while New York City lowered its speed limit for local roads. By contrast, safety features on firearms—such as smartguns unlocked by an owner’s thumbprint or a radio-frequency encryption—are opposed by the National Rifle Association, whose allies in Congress also block funding for the sort of public-health research that might show, in even clearer detail, the cost of America’s love affair with guns.

This is what happens when you mandate safety with one thing and ban it for the other.

[Death from the Sea]

gun safety is not banned, not even close.

[Batman]

Not a real world american so I obviously have no say in this but I'm all in favour of adding 'this individual should not be shot' sensors to guns. I'm waiting with bated breath on how you will actually make that work.

[Simon_Jester]

I don't think gun suicides should be counted. People who attempt suicide with a gun might be more likely to succeed than people who hang, poison, or stab themselves. But for the person who used the gun to kill themselves, the gun is "working as intended-" that is not a malfunction of the device, nor is it a death caused by the device itself.*

Also, looking at the graph in the original article...



...I note that the rate of vehicle fatalities decreased very fast for people between 15 and 25 during the 2006-2009 timeframe, despite remaining largely constant for the fifteen years or so before that. That's what brought the fatality rate down into line with gun crime; before then it was about half again as high. So what happened?

Maybe it was the result of a massive push towards vehicle safety for teenagers, that just happened to bear fruit very quickly... but it might also have been something more mundane like fewer high school and college age kids owning and driving their own cars thanks to the recession.
___________________

*Likewise, I don't think that someone who deliberately drives their car off a cliff should be counted against the dangers of cars- although we don't really know how many people commit suicide behind the wheel. We do know, I think, that the rate of fatal car accidents increases during conditions that cause other kinds of suicide to become more common, though...

[Joun_Lord]

Safety features is all well and good but wouldn't stop the majority of gun deaths. Some drug/weed/SW Holiday Special dealer isn't going to bother to purchase or steal a wepon with a thumbprint reader or will get the necessary skills to remove all that technologicbomb mumble jumble. A person contemplating painting the ceiling with a 12 gauge isn't going to be deterred by a RFID CIA Metal Gear gun disabling compooter chip. Though for accidents, thats why I'm all for safety features especially in homes for children (so long as that safety feature isn't banning firearms in the homes of children but like mandatory low or no cost gun locks so as to make sure poor people aren't priced out of gun ownership).

The fact is people blowing their brains out and killing people with their Glocks (that look an awful lot like Hi-Points) isn't the fault of some hunk of metal and banning them might lesson such things but won't end them. Its far better to rather then intrude on the rights of the majority of people that don't abuse firearms to figure out WHY people be pulling the Kurt Cobain final kurtain call or blowing others away over a freaking plant and some paper. Unfair drugs laws, societal bias against the mentally ill, disgustingly insufficient social safety nets and mental health help, not enough jobs meaning people can't find work and are therefor depressed and can't make money, or fucking violent video games and rock and roll music.

Crime, gun crime and the far less who gives a shit other violent crime like stabbings, beatings with fist, acid and bleach attacks, road rage, explosives, and people being beaten with the ingenious weapon of a rock tied to a stick, will continue whether or not we toss government control chips into our 60 rounds a second Ghost Guns or go full Britain and try to ban everything including airshit guns and pointy kitchen knives. One must go to the root of the problem.

Also looking at the graph by Simon it looks like both car deaths and gun deaths have both dropped significantly.

[Esquire]

...I note that the rate of vehicle fatalities decreased very fast for people between 15 and 25 during the 2006-2009 timeframe, despite remaining largely constant for the fifteen years or so before that. That's what brought the fatality rate down into line with gun crime; before then it was about half again as high. So what happened?

Maybe it was the result of a massive push towards vehicle safety for teenagers, that just happened to bear fruit very quickly... but it might also have been something more mundane like fewer high school and college age kids owning and driving their own cars thanks to the recession.

I'd bet it's the latter, combined with high gas prices (also partly due to the recession). The other possibility that suggests itself is that it wasn't new vehicle safety policies, but rather old ones - or rather, the last generation to not be exposed to them leaving the 15-25 age group, although I don't know where I'd look to check that.

[Raw Shark]

[snip] Crime, gun crime and the far less who gives a shit other violent crime like stabbings, beatings with fist, acid and bleach attacks, road rage, explosives, and people being beaten with the ingenious weapon of a rock tied to a stick, will continue whether or not we toss government control chips into our 60 rounds a second Ghost Guns or go full Britain and try to ban everything including airshit guns and pointy kitchen knives. One must go to the root of the problem.

Also looking at the graph by Simon it looks like both car deaths and gun deaths have both dropped significantly.

The rock-onna-stick may seem laughably quaint now, but the Cro Magnon who figured that shit out and practiced with it first was probably a boss for the rest of his life.

...I note that the rate of vehicle fatalities decreased very fast for people between 15 and 25 during the 2006-2009 timeframe, despite remaining largely constant for the fifteen years or so before that. That's what brought the fatality rate down into line with gun crime; before then it was about half again as high. So what happened?

Maybe it was the result of a massive push towards vehicle safety for teenagers, that just happened to bear fruit very quickly... but it might also have been something more mundane like fewer high school and college age kids owning and driving their own cars thanks to the recession.

I'd bet it's the latter, combined with high gas prices (also partly due to the recession). The other possibility that suggests itself is that it wasn't new vehicle safety policies, but rather old ones - or rather, the last generation to not be exposed to them leaving the 15-25 age group, although I don't know where I'd look to check that.

The movement among youth toward urban centers where you don't need and it might actually be disadvantageous to have a car also probably has something significant to do with it.

[Esquire]

I'd think that was another symptom of the same financial situation, though - urban centers are cheaper, what with the not needing a car and the relative ease of finding roommates, where suburbs are designed around single-family homes that nobody without a decent job can afford. Again, no research done here, just thinking out loud. In print. Whatever.

[General Zod]

One must go to the root of the problem.

You mean like tackle poverty? What are you some kind of socialist?

[Joun_Lord]

One must go to the root of the problem.

You mean like tackle poverty? What are you some kind of socialist?

Confound you! We can't do crap if it might be !!!!SOCIALISM!!!!. Unless its people pulling themselves up by their overly individualistic bootstraps and helping themselves without any help or handouts from the government (unless they are wealthy, then its not a handout its an incentive) then clearly there is no way to solve this problem.

[LaCroix]

...I note that the rate of vehicle fatalities decreased very fast for people between 15 and 25 during the 2006-2009 timeframe, despite remaining largely constant for the fifteen years or so before that. That's what brought the fatality rate down into line with gun crime; before then it was about half again as high. So what happened?

Probably the fact that young people tend to use cheap ass old cars.
The life-threatening tug boats of the 80' are finally rusting to death, and they are starting to use cars built at least in the mid 90's, which make surviving a crash a metric shitton easier. I guess the drop off at the left end of the graph is when they stopped using cars made in the 60/70's...


(But you still hear people yapping about how they'd be rather in a good, old-fashioned steel car in a crash, instead of these modern death-traps...)

So, while the modern idiot is about as bad as the last decade's model, even ass-cheap used cars these days are much safer. Guns still perform the same. The sharp decline in gun deaths in the graph is probably also related to some gun safety regulation or feature, probably also 10-20 years after the fact, as it takes time for measures to take hold.

[Raw Shark]

I'd think that was another symptom of the same financial situation, though - urban centers are cheaper, what with the not needing a car and the relative ease of finding roommates, where suburbs are designed around single-family homes that nobody without a decent job can afford. Again, no research done here, just thinking out loud. In print. Whatever.

Depends on the urban center in question, I guess. Anecdotally speaking, Downtown Denver used to be the hood in the 80s, but is quickly becoming very expensive as the light rail infrastructure improves and bicycle culture continues to escalate here, while some of the suburbs are becoming havens for people who got priced out of town, often sharing what looks like a single-family home and if they're really SOL a single vehicle among several roommates.

[Esquire]

It's the same where I'm from - the trends are starting to swing the other direction, so it'll be interesting to see what things look like in a couple decades.

[Beowulf]

So, while the modern idiot is about as bad as the last decade's model, even ass-cheap used cars these days are much safer. Guns still perform the same. The sharp decline in gun deaths in the graph is probably also related to some gun safety regulation or feature, probably also 10-20 years after the fact, as it takes time for measures to take hold.

Except there wasn't any new gun regulation in the late 70s/early 80s. The next major bill was the Firearm Owner's Protection Act, which did a bunch of revisions, but didn't make anything more difficult to get. Except new machineguns. Legal machine guns have been used in crime in the US, to a rough order of magnitude, never, since the 1934. So it's probably not that. I'd hazard a guess, but don't feel like looking up, that in that same period you'd see a general decline in crime, not just deaths by firearm.

Funnily enough, tetraethyl lead began to be phased out in the mid 70s, as catalytic converters didn't work with leaded gas. This relates to the Lead-crime hypothesis, which basically is: airborne lead from leaded gasoline made people more prone to being dumb and violent, which makes them more prone to crime. Most countries phased out lead at about the same time, and saw decreases in crime at the same time.

EDIT: ok, maybe I'm not too lazy:

lead over time vs violent crime over time, for the US. Note that lead has been shifted by 23 years from the crime. Note also that crime followed roughly the same curve as deaths by firearms in the graph above.

[Gaidin]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPF4fBGNK0U[youtube]
(But you still hear people yapping about how they'd be rather in a good, old-fashioned steel car in a crash, instead of these modern death-traps...)

I think it depends on the crash honestly. If you're up to speed, sure, old fashioned one will do what you just saw. But when there's five cars barely up to anything resembling speed, yet they get stuck in what you can't help but call a pile up but the old car stuck in the middle gets to literally drive away with what you can call a bent bumper. It gets...funny sometimes. For lack of a better word. Especially when the other four are all but forced by insurance to declare their cars totaled due to what the cars are designed to do.

Now, I think I'd rather have the modern car because my friend in that old steel car that got to drive away got a minor case of whiplash and had to drive away to the hospital, while the others got to literally walk away. But that's a different case altogether. Or, well, probably exactly what you're talking about. I think that's the catch of the steel cars and the crashes until you hit what used to be the life threatening ones(where the cars are now designed to absorb the force).

[Flagg]

Cars: Useful for too many things to list, but dangerous.
Guns: Useful in only a small number of circumstances dealing with wildlife, incredibly dangerous and handguns are designed solely to kill people.


Hmmm...

[TheFeniX]

I recall a thread about kids giving up or waiting to drive a few years back. That combined with stricter safety regulations for both driving and vehicle production makes the trend unsurprising.

Guns: Useful in only a small number of circumstances dealing with wildlife, incredibly dangerous and handguns are designed solely to kill people.

I know, right? There's no other reason to even manufacture them. Besides, it's not like there would ever be a reason you may have to use one on a person.

[General Zod]

I recall a thread about kids giving up or waiting to drive a few years back. That combined with stricter safety regulations for both driving and vehicle production makes the trend unsurprising.

Guns: Useful in only a small number of circumstances dealing with wildlife, incredibly dangerous and handguns are designed solely to kill people.

I know, right? There's no other reason to even manufacture them. Besides, it's not like there would ever be a reason you may have to use one on a person.

I can't think of any situation in the last, oh, 20 years or so of my life where owning a gun would have actually helped make things easier or safer.

[TheFeniX]

I can't think of any situation in the last, oh, 20 years or so of my life where owning a gun would have actually helped make things easier or safer.

Your personal experience being representative of the U.S. population? This woman might disagree, but really it's moot either way because "well, I don't need it, why should anyone else?" isn't a compelling argument, anymore so than the idea of handguns being solely design to kill people.

[General Zod]

I can't think of any situation in the last, oh, 20 years or so of my life where owning a gun would have actually helped make things easier or safer.

Your personal experience being representative of the U.S. population? This woman might disagree, but really it's moot either way because "well, I don't need it, why should anyone else?" isn't a compelling argument, anymore so than the idea of handguns being solely design to kill people.

Your argument doesn't really invalidate Flagg's point about being useful in only a "small number of circumstances" either. It's like you take offense to the idea that guns just aren't that useful except for really specific things.

[TheFeniX]

Well, it wouldn't do much to invalidate the claim that older cars can drive off after a low-speed collision either because that wasn't the point I was "arguing" against.

In case I let my sarcasm get the better of me, let me reiterate: The idea that handguns are solely designed to kill people is stupid.

[Jub]

I recall a thread about kids giving up or waiting to drive a few years back. That combined with stricter safety regulations for both driving and vehicle production makes the trend unsurprising.

I can attest to that, I'm 26 so just out of the age group in the study and off the top of my head I think to this day maybe a 1/3 of my high school friends both have vehicles and are licensed to drive. I myself have a learners permit only and no real desire to drive or own a car. I wouldn't even bother with getting a full license but they seem good have in a pinch so I'm going to read my book get some driving lessons this spring.

[General Zod]

Well, it wouldn't do much to invalidate the claim that older cars can drive off after a low-speed collision either because that wasn't the point I was "arguing" against.

In case I let my sarcasm get the better of me, let me reiterate: The idea that handguns are solely designed to kill people is stupid.

This is probably one of the stupider rebuttals made by gun owners. Using it for anything besides it's main purpose doesn't magically change it's main purpose.

[Simon_Jester]

(But you still hear people yapping about how they'd be rather in a good, old-fashioned steel car in a crash, instead of these modern death-traps...)...

I think the main reason for this is psychology- we very rarely see an "old fashioned" car wrecked, and certainly not in a head to head test against a modern car as in the video you linked. But we know on a gut level that steel is stronger than aluminum and that weight correlates with strength...

[Lonestar]

This is what happens when you mandate safety with one thing and ban it for the other.

Whenever someone says "let's regulate guns like automobiles" I think "sure!"


-You can buy guns without a background check

-You can use guns on private property

-At age 16 you can take a test that any idiot can pass and carry in public.

-Said license is reciprocated in all 50 states

-Right to gun ownership cannot be taken away unless you commit a crime specifically related to gun use



But I'm sure that's not what people mean when they say that. Of course, if we regulated cars like guns then we'd have licenses not recognized in other states(in fact, a felony to drive with an out of state license in those states), different engines are illegal (in some cases felonies) in some states, etc.

(FWIW, I'm in favor of universal background checks, required training for public carry, and some other gun control, I'm just pointing out that people seem to think automobile use is more heavily regulated than the other, and in fact that is not really the case)