I am not an SSRN subscriber. Can someone who is, tell me how the authors of this study determined that a gun in the home is an inducement to hot burglary (as opposed to cold burglary)?
----- Original Message ----- From: "Tim Lambert" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Saturday, April 03, 2004 3:57 AM Subject: Re: Unintended (negative) consequences of UK gun control > "Joseph E. Olson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > > Britain has a "hot" burglary rate (occupied dwellings) many (8 ? ) > > times that of the USA. A federal Dept. of Justice study determined that > > the cause was the fact that American burglars (who don't fear the police > > and courts any more than British burglars) are terrified of being shot > > by the occupant. They were very much l aware of incidents in which they > > or associates had been driven off at gunpoint or shot by the American > > home owner. That awareness forced them into seeking out only > > unoccupied dwellings for their criminal activities. > > Perhaps you could provide a cite for this study? > > Perhaps you should look at this paper, which finds that more guns > don't seem to make a difference to the "hot burglary" rate: > > http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=310473 > > The Effects of Gun Prevalence on Burglary: Deterrence vs Inducement > > > PHILIP J. COOK > Duke University - Sanford Institute of Public Policy; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) > JENS LUDWIG > The Brookings Institution - Economic Studies Program > > May 2002 > > NBER Working Paper No. W8926 > > > Abstract: The proposition that widespread gun ownership serves as a > deterrent to residential burglary is widely touted by advocates, but > the evidence is weak, consisting of anecdotes, interviews with > burglars, casual comparisons with other countries, and the like. A > more systematic exploration requires data on local rates of gun > ownership and of residential burglary, and such data have only > recently become available. In this paper we exploit a new > well-validated proxy for local gun-ownership prevalence - the > proportion of suicides that involve firearms - together with newly > available geo-coded data from the National Crime Victimization Survey, > to produce the first systematic estimates of the net effects of gun > prevalence on residential burglary patterns. The importance of such > empirical work stems in part from the fact that theoretical > considerations do not provide much guidance in predicting the net > effects of widespread gun ownership. Guns in the home may pose a > threat to burglars, but also serve as an inducement, since guns are > particularly valuable loot. Other things equal, a gun-rich community > provides more lucrative burglary opportunities than one where guns are > more sparse. The new empirical results reported here provide no > support for a net deterrent effect from widespread gun > ownership. Rather, our analysis concludes that residential burglary > rates tend to increase with community gun prevalence. > > > -- > Tim > _______________________________________________ > To post, send message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] > To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/firearmsregprof _______________________________________________ To post, send message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/firearmsregprof
