The Violence Policy Center yesterday released a ranking of the states by frequency of deaths by firearms. The gun control group concludes states with tougher laws against firearms, such as Massachusetts, have the fewest fatalities:
The analysis reveals that the five states with the highest per capita gun death rates were Louisiana, Alabama, Alaska, Mississippi, and Nevada. Each of these states had a per capita gun death rate far exceeding the national per capita gun death rate of 10.32 per 100,000 for 2006. Each state has lax gun laws and higher gun ownership rates. By contrast, states with strong gun laws and low rates of gun ownership had far lower rates of firearm-related death. Ranking last in the nation for gun death was Hawaii, followed by Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New York.
The VPC’s spin is understandable, but it could be implying more causality than really exists. Massachusetts has long had a low level of gun ownership compared with the rest of the US, so it’s unsurprising that there are fewer gun deaths here — and unsurprising that strong gun control is politically palatable. If Louisiana and Massachusetts swapped gun laws, I doubt that their rankings in the VPC chart would change all that much.
At any rate, here’s how the numbers look geographically:
