In your view, is this analysis amenable to a Schelling type critical mass model?

Hummmm. Seems I recall somewhere that the U.S. Supreme Court (I don't recall the actual Justice who penned the phrase) said something to the effect that "The power to tax is the power to destroy." Have you considered the possible ramification that higher taxes on the legal gun sale "might" have an unintended consequence. i.e., many of the now legal guns will end up in that "illegal" market that you describe? Just a thought.

Sir,
Any chance that increasing the tax on guns could potentially drive some people with legitimate purposes to the underground market as well? Assuming the price there is lower.

Haotian--

The high tax would raise the price of guns in the black market.

I would like to take this opportunity to remind readers of Chris Rock's insightful thoughts on Bullet Control.

Dear Gary:

Thanks for your post. Here are a few quick comments.

"The first would be to impose a high tax on legal gun transactions, which would greatly raise the price of guns purchased legally."

This seems to assume that on net there is a negative externality from gun ownership. You said that you were by passing this question, but I don't see how you can make this first proposal without dealing with the question. If guns are used more frequently to stop crime than facilitate crime, a tax would be inefficient.

"The second step is to punish substantially traffickers in the illegal gun market to discourage individuals who could get guns legally from buying them in the underground market."

This is fine, but the question is how effect this approach is. It is interesting that you raise the comparison to illegal drugs because a lot of effort has been made to stem the flow of illegal drugs with relatively little positive impact.

"one would expect that the demand for guns by individuals is likely to be significantly higher when other persons have more guns, partly because of the desire to protect themselves, and partly because of the culture this creates to own guns."

The FBI UCR indicates that only about 10 percent of violent crime involves a gun in anyway. According to the National Crime Victimization survey only a small portion of defensive gun uses arise when the criminal has a gun. I think the argument here is much more complicated than you think. The first question is: what will happen to total violent crime when gun ownership is reduced? Many island nations such as Britain, Ireland, Jamaica and others have banned guns (a form of tax) and seen increases in murder and other violent crime. The international crime victimization survey shows that violent crime is now twice as high in the England and Wales as it is here. It is interesting to note how murder and violent crime rates in DC and Chicago rose after their gun bans went into effect. For a recent discussion on DC please see here.

--Finally, as I note in response to your first proposal, you can't really put aside the issue of negative externalities. Two points on the Duggan paper.

1) Duggan's paper uses only one gun magazine's sales to measure gun ownership rates. I and others (Moody and Marvell) have looked at the 7 largest gun magazines and his magazine that shows the results that he claims exist. Guns & Ammo, the fourth largest magazine, was quite different than the other magazines in that it was the only one that suffered a drop in sales during the 1990s. Skip Johnson, a vice president for Guns&Ammos and Handguns Magazines parent company Primedia, has said that between 5 and 20 percent of Guns&Ammos national sales during the 1990s were purchases by his company to meet its guaranteed sales to advertisers. These copies were given away for free to dentists and doctors offices. Because the purchases were meant to offset any unexpected national declines in sales, Johnson said that own purchases were very selective and produced very large swings in a relatively small number of counties. More importantly, while a precise breakdown of how these free samples are counted towards the sales in different counties is not available, these self-purchases were apparently related to factors that helped explain why people might purchase guns, and these factors included changing crime rates. Johnson indicated that the issue of self-purchases is particularly important for Guns&Ammo because the magazine had declining sales over part of this period. Handguns Magazine was much newer and experienced appreciable growth.

2) If you look at Duggan's results on right-to-carry laws, he has 30 reported estimates that look at the impact that the laws have on violent crime rates. 14 of the 30 show that right-to-carry laws significantly reduce violent crime (he only lists 12 but the rape and assault claims in column 2 have typos (if you divide the coefficients by the standard errors, you will see that the ratio is greater than 2 implying that they are statistically significant at the 5 percent level for a two-tailed t-test)). Only one of the 30 results imply a bad effect of the law. On murder, 4 of his six estimates imply a statistically significant drop in murder rates from people being able to carry concealed handguns. In addition, More Guns, Less Crime (University of Chicago, 1998 and 2000) showed the bias in using the types of estimates that he used so these results go our way even though they are biased against finding any benefits. The biggest problem is that he is looking at simple before and after averages. Since the crime rates were rising quickly before the law and falling relatively slowly afterwards, comparing only the before and after averages is misleading. The average crime rate after the law is higher despite the decline, this is particularly true for robbery rates.

Both Duggan and Levitt have been told about these issues and nothing was done to correct the issues.

Thanks again for your write up.

Sir,
You make two assertions that should be reviewed. The first being that most guns were purchased on the black market. Are you implying that these are illegal transactions? If so, this cannot be correct. Second, how can you assert that a knife is less lethal than a handgun? Based on the lethality data I have seen I would much rather be shot than stabbed. Some choice!

Regards,

Here I was all ready to quote Professor Lott's book, and he himself beat me to it. Although I guess I can still interject a couple of corrections: One, according to 2000 data, there are over 250,000 guns in the US, and less than 1% of those guns are even involved in a crime. So raw numbers of the things themselves bear very little relation to crimes committed with them.

Two, according to a study by Dr. Edgar Suter ("Guns in the Medical Literature, Journal of the Medical Association of Georgia), "The responsible use and safe storage of any kind firearm causes no social ill, and leaves no victims. In fact, guns offer positive social benefit in protecting good citizens from vicious predators. The overwhelming predominance of data we have examined shows that between 25 to 75 lives may be saved by a gun for every life lost to a gun. Guns also prevent injuries and protect billions of dollars of property every year. In view of the overwhelming benefits, it is ludicrous to punitively tax gun or ammunition ownership. They save far more lives than they cost."

Of course, I strongly recommend John R. Lott's book on the subject (and I'm very glad to see him actively participating in the post), but I simply see no reason to excessively tax something that the founding fathers clearly believed the general populous has a right to, which has much social benefit, and relatively low social risk.

It seems to me that, unlike drugs, the vast majority of guns enter the chain of commerce in the legal side of themarket, and only later cross over into the illegal market. It also seems that the penalties for illegal transactions are weakest precisely at the points where this switch from the legal to the illegal market occurs--licensed dealers who sell to straw buyers, licensed owners who fail to secure their guns, etc.

Wouldn't a national system allowing quick, accurate tracing of all guns and ammunition back to the manufacturer and all (legal) owners, coupled with stronger punishments for allowing guns to migrate outside of this system, be effective in keeping many more guns where they belong?

Your taxing suggestion inevitably raises questions of constitutionality. For this very reason, we have no poll taxes, nor do we impose taxes on owners of printing presses. I suspect that the ultimate intent of the founders in writing the Second Amendment will soon be clarified, and in favor of the individual rights model. That being the case, taxing a fundamental right would seem to be, regardless of its utility, not something we can reasonably do.

The assertion that most firearms are purchased on the black market is also suspect. It would depend, I suppose, on how one defines the black market. If we consider that any purchase not made from a licensed dealer in a storefront retail outlet is a black market transaction, then perhaps this assertion makes a bit more sense, but the overwhelming majority of such transactions surely are not illegal. In fact, it is the widespread, legal availability of firearms in America that ensures that there is little or no need for a real black market in firearms, unlike the experience of our enlightened British cousins whose functional firearm ban has indeed resulted in a flourishing black market in firearms in the classic sense of the term.

As Dr. Lott has pointed out, most of the assumptions underlying this posting hold little water. Firearms are indeed useful, even valuable tools in the hands of the overwhelming majority of their owners.

Would a high tax, for the purpose of limiting the acquiring of, be an infringment of a right?

アダルト

By all means, tax the guns away from the poor people.

Just a couple questions - most of which, I recognize, are generally in-line with the well-established (hackneyed?) logic of gun control opponents:

To what extent would a lower incidence of gun ownership over time (due to the reduced demand) increase the utility of owning a gun (and of armed robbery as a tactic) for criminals? Would the increase in utility wholly or partially offset the price increases expected from your proposed changes to law enforcement/punishment?

What are the most important variables determining the rate of legal gun ownership? Is it really price? Or is legal (sp. handgun) gun ownership determined more in response to prevailing crime levels? ie, until prices get so high as to legitimately raise constitutional questions, aren't legal gun buyers mostly paying for security in the form of deterrence and potential response?

Would raising the price even by 200% through a gun tax change the gun ownership equilibrium level at all? OR - if the tax revenues were applied exclusively to law enforcement and anti-gun-trafficking measures, could you lower the need for and hence the utility of owning a gun legally for protection purposes?

Sadly, I'm not sure you can do anything about the lunatics, especially in a nation with well over 100,000,000 guns. And I'm not sure that there's any contitutional punishment that's severe enough to actually change the prices of illegal guns enough to substantially impact that market. Even if you were able to make the price of an illegal gun $5000 (unlikely), a reasonable cost of capital consideration would have the criminal require an additional, say, $1200 per year in his criminal activities to justify that expense. That's really not that much, and would be clearly justifiable if your tax levy on legal gun ownership succeeded in reducing ownership rates among the criminal's prospective targets!

Taxes are always worth considering when there are significant negative externalities. The first problem here is that the balance of significant externalities has not been clearly quantified. What rate or rates of tax are appropriate?

The second problem is that guns without ammunition are no more dangerous than any other sort of club. We tax tobacco, not pipes and cigarette holders. If tax is appropriate, should it not be on ammunition, not guns? Apart from being more accurately targetted, an ammunition tax would be collected at the factory gate or the bonded store. It would be much less difficult to collect than a tax on each sale.

You said "The number of guns in the United States is huge, probably well over 100 million. Many were purchased legally, but probably most were obtained in the active black market in guns."

Most estimates I have seen indicate the number of privately-owned guns in the US is more like 250 million. The military and the police are not included in this number.

I would be interested in your source for the statement that "most" of these guns were obtained in the "black market", or in violation of the law. Gun sales from owner A to buyer B within a state are covered by state laws. In some states, such as California, such person to person sales are legally required to be done with participation by a licensed gun dealer, involving forms, identification, background checks, waiting periods and payment of fees.

But in most states, the owner of a gun can legally and privately sell it to buyer without any dealer involvement or record keeping requirements. The Federal government has no jurisdiction over this within the state borders. Is this what you are calling a "black market"? If so, I think you should pick a more appropriate name, such as "legal sale".

Dan in Michigan,

I admire your bravery. Personally I'd rather be stabbed in the chest, than shot in the heart by a 45. Calibre Cougar Magnum. I think my chances of survival would be slightly higher.

For that matter, I'd rather have someone stab me in the head with their Swiss Army knife, rather than have them shoot me in the head with their Mac-10 automatic machine gun. Again, I think my chances of surival would be higher.

I always find it interesting after an incident like at Northern, that everyone comes out of the woodwork condemning guns. While at the same time, there is a far more deadly and insidious technology, Autos, Suv's and Trucks; that maim and kill at a far higher annual statistical rate than guns ever have or will. But, we hear nary a whimper regarding the need for increased control or access to the technology or even it's removal from public ownership. Strange huh?

As for access to less developed weapons technology, it's still just as deadly in trained hands, "and as I am a soldier, I will run it up to the hilt". Some people just don't realize how dangerous a swiss army knife can be. As for myself, I prefer Case, the blades are heavier and stronger.

The scariest part in this whole argument is to question what the intentions of the gun buyer might be. One might imagine that a person such as the Northern Illinois shooter would have little concern about the price of a gun if his intentions were to take his own life (along with others) anyway.

I would hope a tax would decrease the number of lesser gun crimes (if there is such a thing) due to the high prices, but it will probably be less productive eliminating the extreme ones, sadly.

"The number of guns in the United States is huge, probably well over 100 million. Many were purchased legally, but probably most were obtained in the active black market in guns."

I am assuming that you mean guns used in crimes were obtained illegally. Intially all guns would be purchased legally through a manufacture. I wouldn't think there are many guns being manufactured illegally.

Overall this was a disappointing blog entry.

This is a really great Story! http://www.spymac.com/details/?2343566

What about also heavily taxing the ammunition used?
There is a difference between hunting ammo, and ammo used for target practice and killing humans.

I think to be effective, you need to tax the razor and the blade.

Firearms as a fundamental right and poll taxes are separate issues. Poll taxes were struck down on equal protection grounds, not based on substantive due process. Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections, 383 U.S. 663 (1966).

Additionally, even if the Second Amendment is interpreted with an individual rights point of view, a high tax would not de facto be unconstitutional on either equal protection or substantive due process grounds. As explained in the main post, there are substantial legitimate reasons for having a high tax on gun ownership. Even if gun ownership were viewed as a fundamental right, fundamental rights are not absolute, and the proposed restrictions would seem to have a chance of passing a strict scrutiny review.

As far as equal protection, one could argue that a high gun tax would deprive the poor from purchasing guns, analogizing to a situation such as poll taxes. This analogy, however, is misplaced. Poll taxes were struck down because the restriction of having a “poll tax” was not related a legitimate qualification to vote. It wasn’t that restrictions couldn’t be put on voting, just that the tax didn’t further any legitimate goal. (Plus, the poor are not a suspect class for equal protection purposes). Regardless, any disparate impact argument against the poor would still fall under a strict scrutiny standard for the same reasons the tax would (arguably) pass under substantive due process.

This is not to pass judgment on the merits of the proposal, but merely that the constitutionality arguments may be overblown.

The estimate is 280 million privately-owned firearms in the United States, as of a few months ago. The train has already left the station.

Funny how those shootings seem to take place most frequently in gun-free zones.

Dear Sir,

Your thoughts on the gun control issue are well intended, but ill-informed. Consider that the most recent estimate of the number of firearms in the U.S. is over 150,000,000. Some estimates place the number at over 200,000,000. Gun control proponants like to imply that guns are like fresh fruit. That if you could impead people's ability to buy a gun that eventually violance would lessen as existing guns wilt away and are disgarded. Guns used in the American Revolutionary War are still around and still able to kill in the hands of a violent offender. Most of the guns already here will be here virtually forever.

In Canada, where gun regestration was required, researchers have estimated that the non-compliance rate was 40%. In South Africa where regestration was required the non-compliance rate is estimated to be as high as 90%.People just don't want to give up their guns.

Several studies have revealed that criminals usually aquire thier guns from aquantances or from family members. Street dealers haunt city streets and bars. Ask any young man from a getto how long it would take him to buy a gun on the street, and he will usually tell you that he can get one in less than an hour. So much for background checks!

You seem to assume by your remakes that there is some kind of a crisis which requires that something be done about all of the guns. Considering your occupation, it's odd that you arn't better informed of the numerical facts. The number of Homicides involving a firearm each year in the U.S. is around 11,000 (per the F.B.I.). The C.D.C. reports that about 1,000,000 Americans die each year from heart dease and stroke. About 500,000 Americans die yearly from cancer. The A.M.A. thinks that as many as 100,000 Americans die each year from medical mal-practice. You seem unaware that around 36,000 Americans die yearly of the flu! Yes, we have a three times greater chance of dieing of flu each year than of being mudered by someone with a gun!

With just 11,000 firearm involved homicides yearly in a population of 300,000,000 people, what is someone's chances of being murdered with a gun? You do the math!

The same day as the most recent school shooting in which six died, eight young people were run down by a car and killed while they stood watching a street drag race. The school shooting made the front page in every newspaper in America. The drag racing tragidy ended up on page three if it apeared at all. This is the nature of the American Press these days. If a gun is involved, reporters will fly in from all over the world to cover the story. Perhaps you can be forgiven for feeling that there is an epademic of gun related violance.

I have been the victim of violent criminals 3 times. The first was an armed robbery. The second was a mugging. The third was an attemped armed robbery. There wasn't a police officer around to save me from any of them. I suggest that you have some converations with police officers on the issue of their ability to prevent violent criminals from harming you. Most of the cops I've taked with tell me that they keep a gun at home, and have trained their spouse to use it for self defense. They know from everyday experence that it is rare indeed for the police to be there to stop a crime in progress.

Isn't it interesting that the mass shootings never happen at shooting ranges, or police stations. If you want to save lives I suggest that you requre signs to be posted on all "gun free zones" warning folks that the means of self defense having been banned, that they are entering a "free fire zone" for violent criminals.

I think it odd that so much attention is paid to the guns the homicidal lunatics use on their rampages, while so little is paid to the fact that there are homicidal lunatics wandering around. It would seem to me that the money and effort that could be spent trying to limit gun availability would probably be much better spent dealing directly with the lunatics.
Even without a gun, these people are going to be causing trouble of some sort, and I think improving the sad state of mental health care for the seriously mentally ill provides a much more direct way of lessening the harm they do to society.
I know that one of my co-workers suffered from manic depression, with a criminal history, and he slid into madness while I and my boss watched helplessly. We knew what was happening and (roughly) what was going to happen, and that it could have been averted by there being a number we could call that would lead to an evaluation of his current mental health, followed by some simple drugs to bring him down.
There is no such number however, so he ended up cutting a guy pretty badly in a bar and fleeing for parts unknown. Which is a shame, because he's a good kid when he's on his medication, not to mention the guy he hurt.
In my opinion we need better laws for involuntarily treating or commitmenting of the severely mentally ill far more than laws governing gun availability.

"Hence the third prong of the desirable approach to gun control would be to add a large extra sentence, larger than is common in many states, to the prison sentence of criminals who used guns to commit crimes. Such greater punishment for using guns to commit crimes would encourage criminals to shift away from guns toward knives and other less lethal weapons."

I think this change in incentives could be contrary to the overall desired effect of reduced gun violence. I say this because by decreasing the difference in the punishments of murder and armed robbery, a thief becomes more likely to use his firearm to murder anyone who would be able to provide sufficient evidence to convict the criminal of armed robbery. People, on average, are not prone to murder and therefore it is difficult to predict how strong of an effect this increased punishment would have, but I still think it is notable.

thanks

In the meantime though, we might add some new signage or rules at the 'zones.' Some possibilities: 'Education or death; a decison for the psychotic,' or 'Carry weapons only with legal permission.' Or just eliminate the 'gun-free zones' in public spaces where they may have increased murder. It seems the 'gun-free zones' were a high minded prelude to a rationale introduction of the rules you suggest, a prelude that is encouraging a full scale production only in the true cognescenti.

Sorry, but I stopped reading when you ridiculously asserted that most of the guns in America (the number is closer to 250 million, by the way) come from the black market. I suggest you do a bit more research on the subject before you make such inane statements. I leave you with the sage words of a man who truly understood the benefit of firearms for personal protection, and articulated the concept more clearly than I could ever hope to...

"An unarmed man can only flee from evil, and evil is not overcome by fleeing from it." -- Col. Jeff Cooper

Getting rid of guns could well be one solution for the lowering of our horrendous levels of gun slaughter as we see in other nations with 20% or less of our homicide rates or even in NYC where that large and diverse city has less gun crime than 192 other cities of over 200,000 population.

But as many posters and the gun activists are quick to point out the rate of gun abuse is very low, ie most gun owners, are not abusing their "right" or "privilege". (depending on what the SC makes of the DC ban)

Much is made of the high RATE of gun and other crime in the "black community", however, we should note that HALF of our prison inmates are "white". Now what is the common denominator that crosses the color line of our prison population? Illiteracy. Rates of literacy in prison are quoted as 30% or lower in a nation, claiming, lit rates of 95% or higher.

Thus, it would seem wise for those who'd rather not feed "gun banners" the fodder of US gun homicide being many times higher than in the "civilized?" nations to use as political leverage it would seem there best shot would be that of improving education and economic opportunity in the "left behind" areas where crime and kill rates are higher than in all but nations engaged in outright civil war.

But ha!! can anyone imagine the NRA set spending their resources and political might in favor of equitable funding for "those" schools? or economic empowerment zones in our areas that are most economically depressed and rife with crime?

I think the difference between say banning drugs and banning guns is that it's a lot harder to manufacture guns than it is to manufacture drugs, moreover it is harder to hide mass production of guns than it is mass production of guns. Now if a country has surrounding it other countries with extensive gun manufacturers, banning guns would be useless and the gun control methods Becker mentioned would be more desirable. But if the country was somewhat isolated from other gun manufacturing countries, as is the case in many European countries, than simply banning guns might be effective.

I disagree with Rand that it is much harder to make guns than to make drugs.
In a market economy, we tend to buy things rather than make them ourselves, because of comparative advantage. But when governments (or other coercive structures) inhibit the market, home production becomes desirable, even lucrative. When I was at school, eighth grade boys took metal shop, and learned how to make metal parts. It's not too much of a leap to have a basement machine shop to make a gun. Look at the number of folks you know who build their own computers, or work on their own cars.
Of course, you could take the next steps of banning machine tools, gunsmithing books, and internet connections, but at substantial social costs.
This post has been an interesting exercise in hypothetical argument. Assume guns are a bad rather than a good, and discuss what follows.

We try to control drugs, and we imprison people who violate our drug laws -- and in the prison we find drugs.

Make the controls on guns as strong as you want -- eventually, when guns are hard to get, the criminals will begin importing them.

Of course, they'll have to camouflage them with a couple tons of cocaine in order to get them across the border.

Prof. Becker,

I am astonished by the offhand way you make the following statement in paragraph 3:

The number of guns in the United States is huge, probably well over 100 million. Many were purchased legally, but probably most were obtained in the active black market in guns.

Do you have the slightest evidence that most purchases are illegal? I offer, in rebuttal, the following page from the NSSF that claims "for the year [2005], approximately 4.7 million new guns were sold". That volume of sales would supply the entire 100 million figure you cite within a mere twenty years. Surely you don't claim that the ATF (who supervises firearms producers and retailers) and the FBI (who runs the National Instant Background Check) are doing such a poor job that they wouldn't notice if the number of new + imported firearms wasn't roughly equivalent to the number of background checks performed?

Not to mention your 100 million figure is about 1/3 of what the industry estimates is the actual total gun ownership in the US [op.cit.] I realize this a a blog, not a scholarly paper, but a closer acquaintance would still be a good thing.

Apologies in advance for the long comment.

Both the original posts by Professor Becker and Judge Posner and some comments on those posts assume a number of predicates that they do not make explicit. One of those is that there is no rational reason for very many people (or any at all) to own a firearm.

I purchased my first firearm as an adult after my apartment in Evanston, an upscale Chicago suburb, was burglarized while I was asleep. I vaguely remember hearing something that night, but it was not enough to rouse me. Fortunately for me, the burglar or burglars were interested in taking only what they could find in plain site, then departed. At one point during the burglary, he/she/they would have been 8-10 feet from the bed in which I was sleeping.

Understandably, I think, I was very disturbed by this experience and had a hard time feeling comfortable in my home for a long time thereafter. I took the necessary legal steps to acquire a handgun (something that I don’t think would be possible in Evanston or Chicago today) and did so.

I’ve had a loaded gun in my home ever since. I don’t live in Illinois any more and have a concealed-carry permit issued by my state. Sometimes I carry a concealed handgun. There's nothing macho or cultural in my use of guns for self-protection. I use them because I believe they will work if I need them.

I practiced law for many years, including criminal law. I represented criminal defendants and was appointed as a special prosecutor on a few complex criminal cases. During this period, I had regular and extensive contact with law enforcement officers from a variety of different agencies.

Most Americans, fortunately, have never had the experience of confronting a potentially violent criminal. Based upon motion pictures and television shows, most people have a script in their mind about what will happen if they are threatened by a criminal. The script goes something like this.

You are in your home alone or with your children at night. You hear a sound of someone outside, then more sounds that lead you to believe that a person is trying to break into your house. Immediately, you go to the phone and call 911. Your call is answered on the first ring. A reassuring emergency dispatcher quickly acquires all relevant information and informs you that police are on the way. The dispatcher tells you to take your phone with you and lock yourself (and any children that are with you) in a secure bathroom or closet to wait for help. You do this and the dispatcher stays on the line to update you on police progress. Very soon, you hear several cars pull to a stop in front of your house. Shortly thereafter, you hear shouted commands. The dispatcher tells you that the police have captured the criminal, that a police officer will be coming to escort you out of your hiding place and that you’re safe now.

Before we analyze how realistic this scenario is, let me point out that your unspoken assumption is that police will arrive fully-armed. If you’re seriously threatened by a criminal, you want to see men and women with guns turn up as quickly as possible. In the scenario above, if the 911 dispatcher told you that an unarmed officer would coming to your house, at a minimum, you would not be satisfied with the emergency response. If the dispatcher told you that the unarmed officer was a 60-year-old man who was 80 pounds overweight, you would be even less satisfied.

How realistic is the mental scenario you have for the police to save you when a criminal is trying to come into your house? Let me enumerate the ways that things can go wrong.

1. You may not be awake. See #2 below.

2. You may not hear a sound. Most successful burglars or rapists or other home invaders don’t make sounds loud enough for you to hear. Your first indication that a criminal is in the house may be when he/she walks into the room where you are.

3. You may hear some very loud sounds. This means that someone is rapidly breaking through a door or window and doesn’t care if anyone inside hears. It is less likely that this criminal’s intent is to steal something, then quietly leave. A motivated home invader can get into almost any home very quickly.

4. If you hear a small sound, almost certainly you won’t immediately call 911. You don’t want to be the source of a false alarm. You’ll go to check on the sound. It might be a cat or a neighbor doing something innocent. It is very likely that whoever is breaking in will make additional progress while you’re investigating. Certainly, you are much more likely to be near the criminal when they enter the house.

5. You might not be able to make the call. Criminals watch the same TV shows that you do and they don’t want you to call 911. There are lots of ways they can dissuade you from doing so.

6. The 911 dispatcher might not answer right away. Due to budget constraints or politicians who want “more feet on the street,” money to hire additional dispatchers might be what got cut out of this year’s budget. If it’s Saturday night and the town is hopping, it’s very likely that your call won’t be answered on the first ring.

7. The 911 dispatcher might get your information wrong. Sending police to the wrong address is less likely to happen with modern phone systems, but police do go to wrong addresses and dispatchers might miss something else important that you say. You’re not going to be at your most articulate during this call.

8. Now we get to the part you will really not like to think about. The police might not come for a long time. Even a response that seems prompt to the police won’t seem prompt to you if a criminal is walking around your house.

A good average response time for a high-priority 911 call in a major city is 7 minutes. 5 minutes is considered very fast. In December, it was reported that virtually every police officer in Omaha was sent to a large shopping mall in response to numerous 911 calls reporting shooting. The response time was 6 minutes. What was not reported was that any other Omaha 911 calls that were received when everyone was at the mall had response times measured in hours.

How quickly can you walk around and look in every room in your home? Unless you’re Donald Trump, it takes a lot less than 7 minutes. If your criminal looks all around your home shortly after entering, he/she is going to find you before the police arrive. If there are two criminals working together, they’re going to find you even sooner.

9. If nobody opens the door, the police officer might not come into your home right away. If there is a serious criminal in your home, it is extremely dangerous for an officer to enter that home at night, especially without backup. The criminal inside knows where the doors are and can be perfectly positioned to meet the officer with deadly force as soon as the officer enters. The officer has taken an oath promising to uphold the law, but the officer did not promise to get killed entering your home. At Columbine High School, a deputy sheriff was assigned to the school and was sitting in his car right next to the school when he received a direct call for help from a janitor inside the school. No officers entered the school for more than 20 minutes. As we sadly learned at Columbine, a lot can happen in 20 minutes.

I won’t elaborate any further on all the ways the call-911-and-wait scenario can and does go wrong. If I believe that one or more criminals may enter my house uninvited, is it rational for me to believe that the police will insure my safety? If I am a woman with a boyfriend who is stalking me, is it rational for me to believe that the police will arrive in time to enforce the court’s restraining order if the boyfriend is kicking down my apartment door at midnight?

If I believe that I may be endangered by one or more criminals entering my house, is it rational for me to use a firearm to protect myself?

As has been mentioned in another comment, unless prohibited from doing so, law enforcement officers almost universally have one or more loaded firearms in their homes and have instructed their spouses how to use the gun to protect themselves. In my experience, in the woman with the stalking boyfriend situation described above, if the woman has no choice but to stay in her home, virtually all officers will advise the woman to obtain a gun to protect herself, unless it is illegal for her to do so.

If we want people with guns to come and protect us when we are threatened, is it rational for us to own a gun, so we don’t have to wait for such protection?

What does a gun do under these circumstances? I will leave it to Dr. Lott to cite specific studies, but the most common response of a criminal who is confronted with an armed victim is to depart. In most cases, simply showing the gun ends the confrontation. Criminals as a group may not have the best reasoning skills, but most do want to continue living after they complete their crime, so they don’t like to take on someone who is armed.

In a crime that may involve a confrontation with the victim – robbery, assault, rape, etc. – a criminal will typically seek to establish a situation in which the victim can intimidated into submission or can be physically overwhelmed. This is why women and the elderly tend to be overrepresented as victims of this type of crime and why criminals sometimes operate in groups so they can overpower any single victim.

A firearm changes the calculus in these scenarios. A 250 pound criminal may not be able to overcome a 100 pound woman who has a gun without being harmed. A gang of three criminals may calculate that one or more of them will be seriously injured if they try to rob a single victim who is armed.

At least one blog - http://www.claytoncramer.com/gundefenseblog/blogger.html - includes numerous posts concerning civilians who use firearms to protect themselves. It makes for interesting reading.

Dear Dan from Michigan, I disagree with you in the fact that knife is as much as dangerous as a gun. I think that the gun is more because you can shoot with distance and not being held but with a knife you may be held after atacking the first person.