Trends in gun ownership in the USA [View all]
Last edited Fri Feb 21, 2014, 06:53 PM - Edit history (1)
"Despite the high number of guns estimated to be in the U.S., indications are that gun ownership is actually on the decline. The long-running General Social Survey, maintained at the University of Chicago, has been asking about gun ownership since its inception in the 1970s. It has found that the number of people who say they have a gun in their home is at an all time low hovering around 30 percent, from a high of 50 percent in the 1970s."
- Snip -
Survey data shows self-reported gun ownership peaked at 53 percent in 1973 before seeing a fairly steady decline to 32 percent in 2010, the most recent year available. He cautioned singling any one year out, saying the numbers are better judged in the context of a whole: the 1970s averaged about 50 percent, the 1980s averaged 48 percent, the 1990s at 43 percent and 35 percent in the 2000s."
- Snip -
"Smith pointed to several main factors responsible for the overall decrease in firearm ownership: a general decline in hunting, the rise of single-adult households and an overall drop off in crime."
- Snip -
"Gallup polling from 2007 to 2012 found that gender, region of the country and marital status were some of the biggest predictors of whether an individual owned guns. In the South, 38 percent reported owning a gun, compared to 27 percent in the West or 21 percent in the Eastern U.S."
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/03/19/how-many-people-own-guns-in-america-and-is-gun-ownership-actually-declining/
Second Amendment absolutists claim that people tend to lie to pollsters, but the statistical margins of error incorporated in polls take that possibility into account. Second Amendment absolutists point to increased sales of guns in areas where sensible gun control laws have been overturned by right-wing courts as "proof" that more Americans have guns, but they don't take into account the number of Americans who have disposed of their guns for various reasons.
I am confident that the general decline in gun ownership in this country will continue until, like cigarettes, guns will become a recognized public health hazard and shunned by new generations.