According to the researchers, an extraordinarily high rate of gun ownership in the U.S. has contributed to the prevalence of violence here. Computation method: Some of the notes below refer to a previous version of the table that used numbers from Small Arms Survey 2007. This number for a country does not indicate the percentage of the population that possesses guns. Alaska, Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi rank in the top four for highest rates of gun-related deaths, with rates that are higher than 18 gun deaths per every 100,000 people. Individually, each one is too small to be useful, said Terry Schell, a senior behavioral scientist at RAND and the reports lead author. The U.S. has more than one gun for every man, woman and child on the planet in the country, and thats the highest per capita rate of gun ownership in any country, DeFoster said. Were trying to identify the true value of gun ownership that would explain all of the available data from all of these measures, said Schell. Persons owning several guns tended to have varied collections, including rifles, Our team, our mission, our partners, and more. leading cause of death for children and teens in the U.S. in 2020. Sign Up According to the anti-gun sentiment, this means just about every one of us should be dead in the street, but if you look around, that simply isnt the case. In, ATF. Conversely, the states with the lowest gun deaths per capita are Massachusetts , New York , New Jersey , Hawaii , and Rhode Island , all of November 15, 2022. Are you interested in testing our business solutions? See also: Percent of households with guns by country. Various state laws surrounding registration and permits also drive these statistics, since states throughout the South, Midwest, and West have more relaxed laws overall in reference to the steps required for registration and carrying when compared to many Northern states. Gallup. Best Low Recoil 9mm Pistol Reviews And Buyers Guide, Best Shotgun Recoil Pads: Top Picks on The Market, Best Recoil Pads: Reviews and Buyers Guide. States with stricter gun laws and larger populations tend to have lower rates of gun registration, while those with less restrictive rules and lower population densities often have higher registered firearm ownership levels. But women are quickly gaining ground in this department. Percentage of households in the United States owning one or more firearms from 1972 to 2022 [Graph]. For example, for several years Pew has asked participants, Do you happen to have any guns, rifles or pistols in your home? Surveys with more detailed and specific questions about ownership are scarcer, perhaps because those questions are likely to dissuade gun owners from participating altogether. Law Enforcement Approaches for Reducing Gun Violence, Personal Firearm Storage in the United States, The Challenges of Defining and Measuring Defensive Gun Use, Methodological Challenges to Identifying the Effects of Gun Policies, state-level estimates of household firearm ownership from 1980 to 2016. This map presents the average proportion of adults living in a household with a firearm, between 2007 and 2016. Please do not hesitate to contact me. Corporations, Minnesota Bill Would Limit Political Spending by Foreign-Influenced U.S. subscribe.submit(); While gun homicides dominate media coverage of gun violence, the largest category of gun deaths in the United States is suicide. Domestic gun manufacturing boomed in the years before the recent rise in gun deaths and shooting incidents. Tackling Climate Change and Environmental Injustice, The positions of American Progress, and our policy experts, are independent, and the findings and conclusions presented are those of American Progress alone. [Online]. For the purpose of this article, were focusing on the total percentage of gun ownership in relation to the states population. Chart. Data shows how the gun landscape has changed in the last decade. The lowest arms ownership rate is 14.7% in Massachusetts and New Jersey and 14.8% in Rhode Island, and 14.9% in Hawaii. "Percentage of Households in The United States Owning One or More Firearms from 1972 to 2022. gun ownership per To estimate gun ownership, researchers facing a lack of direct data have typically turned to proxies Cookies used to track the effectiveness of CDC public health campaigns through clickthrough data. For instance, there are states with low per capita rates such as Hawaii and Washington, while others like Wyoming, West Virginia, and South Dakota have high rates. Saving Lives, Protecting People, CDC/National Center for Health Statistics, U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. Our aim is not just to change the conversation, but to change the country. Available: https://www.statista.com/statistics/249740/percentage-of-households-in-the-united-states-owning-a-firearm/, Percentage of households in the United States owning one or more firearms from 1972 to 2022, Available to download in PNG, PDF, XLS format, Gun ownership in the U.S. 2022, by gender, Gun ownership in the U.S. 2021, by ethnicity, Gun ownership in the U.S. 2021, by education level, Gun ownership U.S. 2022, by party affiliation, U.S. number of firearms manufactured 1986-2021, Number of total firearms manufactured U.S. 2021, by firearm category, Economic impact of U.S. sporting arms and ammunition industry 2020, Number of exported firearms U.S.1986-2021, U.S. number of exported firearms manufactured 2021, by firearm category, Number of imported firearms U.S. 1986-2020, Number of imported firearms U.S. 2020, by firearm category, NICS background checks performed in the U.S. 1998-2021, Number of homicides by firearm in the U.S. 2006-2021, Homicides by firearm in the U.S. 2006-2020, Homicide by firearm rate in the U.S. 2006-2020, Murders involving firearms in the U.S. 2020, by state, Number of firearm deaths U.S. 2019, by gender, U.S. public opinion on the strictness of laws covering firearms sale 1990-2022, Support for stricter gun control laws U.S. 2022, by party, Support for protecting or limiting gun ownership rights U.S. 2022, by party, U.S. public opinion on a law that bans private handgun possession 1990-2022, Support for banning assault-style weapons in the U.S. 2022, by party, Support for banning high-capacity ammunition magazines U.S. 2022, by party, Percentage of U.S. population who know gun violence victims, as of 2013, Gun ownership in the U.S. 2012, by ethnicity, Gun ownership in the U.S. 2012, by education, Gun ownership in the U.S. 2017, by region, United States: presence of a firearm at home 2022, Gun ownership in the U.S. 2014, by gender, U.S. public opinion on safety gains through more concealed weapons 2015, U.S. public opinion on background checks for all gun purchases 2015, How many Americans agree with concealed carry, by gender 2018, Number of registered firearms in South Korea 2007-2016, U.S. public opinion on people in neighborhood watch programs carrying guns 2012, U.S. public opinion on the "stand your ground laws" in March 2012, Firearm ownership rate, by household income U.S. 2014, Satisfaction with gun policy in the US 2014, Latin America & Caribbean: number of armed civilians by country 2017, Firearm ownership rate, by proximity to urban centers U.S. 2017, Find your information in our database containing over 20,000 reports, large number of deaths due to firearms in the country. There have been twice as many active shooter incidents in the last 11 years as there were in the 11 before, FBI data shows. IE 11 is not supported. Then they used a second technique, structural equation modeling, to combine those adjusted surveys with the other proxy measures to produce the final estimates. var subscribe = document.getElementById('enSubscribeFooter'); How it works: Hover over or tap on a line on the chart to identify the state and year shown. In contrast, New York, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Hawaii are at the other end of the spectrum, with rates lower than five gun deaths per every 100,000 people. The majority of gun owners are 50 years of age or older, and make up over 60% of demographics, with the next group falling between 30 and 49 years of age. The only other State with less than 20 percent arms ownership in New York, at 19.9 percent. This figure displays mean estimated household gun ownership rates for each state for 2007 to 2016. Sign up now to get our latest stories and eye-opening briefings. American Indians and Native Alaskans are also disproportionately affected: In Alaska, Native Alaskans make up 16 percent of the population and account for 27 percent of gun homicide victims, while in North Dakota, American Indians make up 5 percent of the population but are victims of more than 20 percent of gun homicides. { document.getElementById('search-form').focus(); }, 300);">, the FBIs Supplemental Homicide Reports, Ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, Provide adequate and sustained funding for local violence intervention programs, Require background checks for all gun sales, including at gun shows and online, Enable federal public health agencies to conduct research into gun violence, Strengthen laws to disarm all domestic abusers, Enact extreme risk protection order laws to provide a tool to help individuals in crisis. Unintentional shootings accounted for approximately 2 percent of gun deaths from 2008 through 2017. Your tax-deductible donation to The Trace will directly support nonprofit journalism on gun violence and its effects on our communities. Heres where the lack The majority of gun owners are male, and make up around 43% of gun owners. The Center for American Progress is an independent nonpartisan policy institute that is dedicated to improving the lives of all Americans through bold, progressive ideas, as well as strong leadership and concerted action. Is Mental Illness a Risk Factor for Gun Violence? } Researchers can use these annual, state-level measures of household gun ownership rates to test theories about the relationship between gun ownership and crime, injury, and public policy. Wyoming 25.9. Montana leads the country in firearm ownership, with an estimated 64 percent of adults living in gun-owning households between 2012 and 2016. The top 5 states that currently have the most guns include: But these are large states, with large populations. The Small Arms Survey Access to this and all other statistics on 80,000 topics from, Show sources information WebThe household ownership of firearms has declined in recent decades. Profit from the additional features of your individual account. In 2022, statistic alerts) please log in with your personal account. There are estimated to be over 400 million guns in the United States between police, the military, and American civilians. Over 393 Million (Over 98%) of those guns are in civilian hands, the equivalent of 120 firearms per 100 citizens. So, to support research in this area, RAND developed a longitudinal database of state-level estimates of household firearm ownership from 1980 to 2016. All the numbers in the main column of the table below are from the annex table of Small Arms Survey 2017. Learn about our sister organization, the Center for American Progress Action Fund, an advocacy organization dedicated to improving the lives of all Americans. In fact, in 2020 alone, it is estimated that 5 million Americans became first-time gun owners. Among states, however, disparities in gun homicide rates are significant: Four states present rates of gun homicides that are higher than six per every 100,000 people. WebIn the Northeast, gun ownership was below the national average, ranging from 5.8% in Rhode Island to 28.8% in Vermont. Murder victims by weapon used in the U.S 2021, Mass shootings in the U.S.: legality of shooter's weapons, as of February 2023, Number of registered weapons U.S. 2021, by state, Worst mass shootings in the U.S., as of January 2023. A production manager for Battle Rifle Co. works on the rails of an AR-15-style rifle in Webster, Texas, in 2017. (October 15, 2021). Lethal gun violence is only part of the problem: Shootings have a devastating impact on communities even when no one is killed. Best Buddies Turkey Ekibi; Videolar; Bize Ulan; gun ownership per capita by state 27 ub. Most gun owners are also college-educated, with over 50% of owners having attended college, or obtained post-graduate degrees. WebAverage Gun Ownership, by State This map presents the average proportion of adults living in a household with a firearm, between 2007 and 2016. There are about 120 civilian-owned guns for every 100 residents here, according to Small Arms Survey, a Swiss group that favors gun control. It provides estimates of the total number of civilian guns in a country. Wyoming closely follows at 66.2%, with Alaska in third at 64.5%. Of those who do not own a gun, 36% claim they are not opposed to ownership in the future. Despite the varying levels of registered guns from one state to another, the overall estimated rate of civilian firearm ownership in the country is around 40%. Information about how many Americans own guns, and how this varies over time and across the United States, is important for understanding the effects of gun laws on firearm ownership and other outcomes, such as firearm homicides, firearm suicides, and mass shootings. One in every 4 victims of fatal unintentional shootings is younger than 21 years old. (seeFigure 2). One likely explanation is that the demographic of people who own several guns is expanding, and many newly purchased guns are going to households where a gun is already present. The authors analysis of the FBIs Supplemental Homicide Reports shows that from 2007 through 2016, more than 5,250 women were murdered with a gun by an intimate partner. The RAND team adjusted the surveys by applying a statistical technique called multilevel regression and poststratification, which improved the state-level reliability of the estimates. Other proxies, some of which have been used in combination with firearm suicides, include per capita measures of hunting licenses, firearm background checks, and even subscriptions to Guns & Ammo magazine. Most look to firearms as protection, with hunting and recreation coming in as secondary reasons respectively. States are categorized from highest rate to lowest rate. Montana has the highest with 66.3%, followed by Wyoming with 66.2%, and Alaska with 64.5%. To use individual functions (e.g., mark statistics as favourites, set Those that have guns are much more likely to be what you might consider collectors, Schell said. Wyoming follows with 60 percent and Alaska with 59. Up to four states can be selected at a time. Gun sales in the U.S. are rising. 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