Posted on 03/11/2013 4:03:42 PM PDT by Kaslin
There's something odd with a Sunday New York Times report on gun ownership in America. They claim the number of Americans owning guns are at its lowest since the 1970s. They attribute it to a reduction in violent crime, which contradicts the media narrative that we need more gun control, and the increased rates of Americans settling in urban areas. The problem is two years ago; the number of Americans owning guns was at 47 percent. Now, it's 35 percent. So, there was a twelve-point drop in two years, and a little over three months after Sandy Hook.
How could that be right? Here's what the Times duo of Sabrina Tavernise and Robert Gebeloff reported:
The gun ownership rate has fallen across a broad cross section of households since the early 1970s, according to data from the General Social Survey, a public opinion survey conducted every two years that asks a sample of American adults if they have guns at home, among other questions.
The rate has dropped in cities large and small, in suburbs and rural areas and in all regions of the country. It has fallen among households with children, and among those without. It has declined for households that say they are very happy, and for those that say they are not. It is down among churchgoers and those who never sit in pews.
The household gun ownership rate has fallen from an average of 50 percent in the 1970s to 49 percent in the 1980s, 43 percent in the 1990s and 35 percent in the 2000s, according to the survey data, analyzed by The New York Times.
In 2012, the share of American households with guns was 34 percent, according to survey results released on Thursday. Researchers said the difference compared with 2010, when the rate was 32 percent, was not statistically significant.
Additionally, it takes the Times until the twelfth paragraph to say, "measuring the level of gun ownership can be a vexing problem, with various recent national polls reporting rates between 35 percent and 52 percent. Responses can vary because the survey designs and the wording of questions differ." By the sixteenth paragraph, they finally write what the NRA has to say about this development.
Andrew Arulanandam, a spokesman for the National Rifle Association, said he was skeptical that there had been a decline in household ownership. He pointed to reports of increased gun sales, to long waits for gun safety training classes and to the growing number of background checks, which have surged since the late 1990s, as evidence that ownership is rising.
In 2011, Gallup reported that "forty-seven percent of American adults currently report that they have a gun in their home or elsewhere on their property. This is up from 41% a year ago and is the highest Gallup has recorded since 1993, albeit marginally above the 44% and 45% highs seen during that period."
While Gallup says that the current number of homes with guns is around 43%, it's hardly a four-decade decline in ownership. If you look at the chart, from 1996-2012, it's been roughly holding steady at 42-43%, so the decline has stagnated.
Lastly, the Times reported that women are heading more households, which has contributed to the decline. What they forget the mention is that women are the fastest growing demographic taking up ownership of firearms, which was a development reported on by ABC News earlier this month - and by CBS News in 2011. What's more embarrassing is that the New York Times reported in February of 2013 that the "Rising Voice of Gun Ownership is Female."
The country's changing demographics may also play a role. While the rate of gun ownership among women has remained relatively constant over the years at about 10 percent, which is less than one-third of the rate among men today, more women are heading households without men, another possible contributor to the decline in household gun ownership. Women living in households where there were guns that were not their own declined to a fifth in 2012 down from a third in 1980.
So, it seems the New York Times is trying to pigeonhole women as the more docile group, who view guns as anathema to society, which contributed to a "decline" in gun ownership. It looks like this is demonstrably wrong, and that staff writers seldom look through their own archives before posting erroneous stories about gun ownership in the hopes of building new momentum for the president's crumbling gun control agenda.
I would never tell a survey that I have guns, or how many, or what kind, or when I got them, or where I store them. I wonder how many are like me, that are not included in the homeowners with guns statistics?
I suspect that the reason for the drop in gun ownership is due to the number of boating accidents that are being reported here on FR.
Gee, the media and government spend years treating gun owners the same way they treat smokers and divorced fathers and then...gasp...people stop telling complete strangers on the phone the truth about owning a firearm. Imagine that.
Yeah . . . keep thinking that . . . I’m ready for a rumble as well as many other Americans. Come and get it.
Well, if nobody owns guns anymore, what’s the hubbub, bub?
I wonder how many responses were along the lines of “None of your damn business!”
Precisely. I hope all NRA members and gun owners will mis-inform the lefty libtards who are taking their "survey" about gun ownership.
It's none of their business.
I’ve been asked several times in the last few years by cops and doctors if I have any guns in the house. The answer is always NO.
You should have seen that tsunami! There I was, minding my own business in a canoe, with every firearm I had ever owned and several I had borrowed from a neighbor . . .
Even the liberals aren’t stupid enough to not be armed. They just think they’ll hide it. I’d imagine the real number is closer to 75%. At least half won’t admit it. I wouldn’t either.
I doubt they'd have to make up numbers. I would expect that the percentage of gun owners who would admit to gun ownership on a telephone poll has dropped significantly over the last few years, and that drop may be more significant than the increase in the actual number of owners.
Really> I was personally convinced that the drop in gun ownership in the USA was a direct result of the cancellation of the 32nd Annual Berkeley Hills Bicycle Race which, as is well known, was far, and by far, a better deterrent to nuclear proliferation than an order of deep fried pork rinds at Abdul ‘Sparky’ Jaiman’s Old Fashioned Mecca-Style Pork BBQ.
The gun-grabbers can go suck on a 17.5-inch 12-Guage barrel. And like it!
;-\
Can you imagine their surprise when they declare martial law and things go drastically awry?
I wish people wouldn’t talk about this. I am still suffering nightmares over that tragic day on the water.
So that means that Congress can just forget about passing any new gun laws. Move on, nothing to see there anymore. We can just refer all of them to this article which is posted on the Internet and we know there is never anything on the Internet that isn’t true.
In the last four months, Americans have purchased enough new guns to completely rearm the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) of China and the Indian Army TWICE and have 300,000+ guns left over. This number does not include private sales. So, NYT, tell me how the number of gun owners is shrinking? I think not.
68,000,000 new guns sold since Obama took office.
Were the old ones rusting away? Or are the new guns being bought up by all the same people, and no one is buying their “first gun.”
It never dawns on them that attempts by the government and the media to ridicule, marginalize and discredit gun ownership could result in a rise in the number of gun owners who do not trust either one.
Many gun owners have decided it is not a wise move to advertise their gun ownership.
If the media knows you have a .22 rifle and a box of cartridges they will expose you as the dangerous owner of a large arsenal.
If some school boards find out there is a gun in your house they might try to declare you to be an unfit parent.
If some doctors find out you have a gun in your house they might declare you to be a public menace.
If the government knows you have a gun you will make it easier for them to confiscate it.
And that is exactly their long term objective
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