Word: crimed
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...however, the author of a new book, More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws, has analyzed crime rates in the 10 states that passed right-to-carry laws from 1977 to 1992. He contends that after more relaxed concealed-carry laws were enacted, murders fell an average of 8%, rapes 5% and aggravated assaults 7%. (For the same period in the entire country, the number of murders went up 24%, and rapes 71%. Assaults more than doubled.) The purported reason: would-be criminals were deterred from choosing victims who just might have a pistol tucked in their...
...here's one: Do those laws really protect people and cut crime? A study published in 1995 showed that guns were used defensively about 2.5 million times a year and that in only 5% of cases were defenders harmed after they brandished their gun. But such findings were based on narrow surveys whose scope, upon re-examination by gun-control advocates, could easily have been exaggerated. Thus, discerning the benefits of packing heat has largely remained a matter of conscience, not science...
More Guns, Less Crime has touched off furious protests from gun-control lobbyists and criminologists, who call the book's research spurious, its statistics suspect and its conclusion--that "allowing law-abiding citizens to carry concealed handguns will save lives"--dangerous. Part of what's threatening about the book is its author: John Lott, a wonkish University of Chicago economist who has never been an N.R.A. member and prior to writing the book did not own a gun. (He has since bought a .38-cal. pistol.) "If I had really strong views about guns," he says, "I wouldn't have...
...book claims to be the most comprehensive look ever at the effect of gun laws on crime, examining data from all 3,054 U.S. counties over a span of 18 years. The findings are startling. Not only did violent crime drop after states relaxed concealed-weapon laws, but it tumbled more precipitously the longer the laws were on the books: after five years, murder was down 15%, rape 9%. The two groups most vulnerable to violent crime--women and blacks--benefit the most after the easing of the laws. And in right-to-carry states, the average death rate from...
...easily lead to a more heavily armed army of robbers and assaulters who will fire first and ask questions later." Jens Ludwig, a professor of pubic policy at Georgetown University, contends that the book does not account for fluctuating factors like poverty levels and policing techniques, which might affect crime rates even more than gun laws...