----- Original Message ----- From: "David Hobby" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Killer Bs Discussion" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, August 10, 2003 11:46 PM Subject: Re: Most Dangerous States--"43 times"
> Dan Minette wrote: > > ... > > > "Mortality studies such as ours do not include cases in which burglars > > or > > > intruders are wounded or frightened away by the use or display of a > > firearm. > > > Cases in which would-be intruders may have purposely avoided a house > > known > > > to be armed are also not identified.A complete determination of firearm > > > risks versus benefits would require that these figures be known." > > > > And the best way to show how this is true is to show how the % of people > > who are victims of crimes and own guns are much lower than the % of people > > who simply own guns. If owning guns is as much of a deterrant as this > > author suggests, than one should see a significantly lower crime rate for > > households that have guns vs. households that don't. > > That's certainly a good way to do the study. But one > should control for the amount of crime in the neighborhood as > well, since it could well be that gun ownership is higher in > high crime neighborhoods.
I have no argument with that. But, my understanding of gun ownership around here is that its not really a neighborhood by neighborhood thing, but more of an area by area thing. Nonetheless, normalizing for % of gun ownership as a function of the crime rate in an area/neighborhood is a necessary control for a good study...at least it has to be done one way or another.
Dan M.
Would there be some relevance to legal gun ownership?
Kevin T. - VRWC Armed, but not dangerous
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