Gun deaths set to outstrip car fatalities for first time in 2015

[Tommy_Carcetti]

Source: Yahoo News

Deaths from firearms are set to outstrip car fatalities for the first time, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and reported by Bloomberg News.

The CDC estimates that auto-related deaths--long on the decline as more motorists wear seat-belts and face harsher penalties for drunk driving--will fall to 32,000 in 2015. Deaths from firearms, which include suicides and accidents, are estimated to rise to 33,000 over the same period.

Every day, 85 Americans are shot dead, about 53 of them in suicides. This figure is still lower than 1993's peak in gun deaths (37,666), but has risen significantly since firearm deaths reached a low in 2000 (28,393). The data goes back to 1979.

Meanwhile, USA Today, which looked at FBI figures, reports that 774 people were killed between 2006 and 2010 by a mass killer, defined as a person who kills four or more people in one incident. The figures show that mass killers strike on average once every two weeks. A third of the 156 mass killings did not involve firearms, but rather fire, knife or other weapon. Almost all of the mass killers in those years were men, and their average age was 32. The dozens of deaths caused by mass killers represented about 1 percent of all homicides between 2006 and 2010.


Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/gun-deaths-set-outstrip-car-fatalities-first-time-152632492.html

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Yeah....um....NRA....about those tired talking points of yours.....

[Aristus]

1. Mandatory seat-belt laws??? Stiff penalties for drunk driving?... Aren't these...um...regulations?

And you mean to tell me they worked in reducing car-related deaths?...

Has someone told the NRA about these regulations?...

[former9thward]

16. No they are not regulations.

They are laws passed by state legislatures. Regulations are put forward by non-elected agencies.

[Aristus]

23. The point is, they are legal strictures that have a demonstrable benefit on the public health.

Legislation, regulation, as long as it saves lives...

[slackmaster]

2. Good news being spun as bad news

It's great that rates (not raw counts, rates) of BOTH gun deaths and vehicle deaths are down.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

3. Quote me the number of intentional vehicular homicides vs. intentional gun deaths and get back to me

If they both are the same low number, then I'll proclaim it to be good news.

[slackmaster]

13. The factoid being touted in the cited article has nothing to do with intentional vehicular homicides

It's about all vehicle-related deaths.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

24. Right. Except the Cars vs. Guns comparision is commonly used by gun enthusiasts.

So if one wants to make a true analogy and not a false one, that clarification needs to be made.

[slackmaster]

30. In this case YOU are the one who brought cars vs. guns into the discussion

I hope you are sufficiently disgusted with your own behavior.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

38. I only brought it in because people like you love to repeat the analogy ad nauseum.

Even though it is fatally flawed.

[The Magistrate]

5. That, Sir, was Not Even A Good Try....

"Every day, 85 Americans are shot dead, about 53 of them in suicides. This figure is still lower than 1993's peak in gun deaths (37,666), but has risen significantly since firearm deaths reached a low in 2000 (28,393). The data goes back to 1979."

What the piece actually reports is that deaths owing to fire-arms have risen significantly over the last decade ( running at present about 31,000, compared to the low of about 28,000 ), and are expected to rise still further in coming years.

[slackmaster]

14. Surely someone with the lofty title of Magistrate has a basic knowledge of statistics.

Such as the difference between a rate per unit of population vs. a raw count.

[The Magistrate]

18. Not Relevant Here, Sir

Raw figures are all that the article presents, and in fact the rate of increase in fire-arms deaths does slightly exceed the rate of increase in the population. Fire-arm deaths stopped decreasing some while ago, and are making a come-back. It is understandable you find this fact uncomfortable, and wish to avoid facing it, because you are wedded to the idea more guns in private hands will make people safer....

[slackmaster]

19. Baloney

...you are wedded to the idea more guns in private hands will make people safer....

I've never said any such thing.

Why must you be dishonest in every interaction you have with me?

[The Magistrate]

27. Always Fun, Sir, To See 'Team NRA' Types Deny Their God When Pressed Before An Audience

You are doing a fair imitation of St. Peter before the cock crowed, but will convince no one. Your position in this matter is well known.

[bongbong]

28. Good stuff, Mr. Magistrate

I admire the way you smack down the Delicate Flowers.

I can't get past the "mocking them" phase, since they're so filled with BS (AKA NRA Talking Points) and fear.

[FailureToCommunicate]

34. That, dear Sir, was a refreshing retort!

[happyslug]

22. Could economics play a part? In 1993 we were coming out of one recession, ...

in 2000 we were at the end of the Clinton boom, even African American Unemployment was dropping in the late 1990s. Thus the best way to drop gun deaths is to get the economy going, especially among low income groups.

On the other hand, Automobile usage, while affected by the overall economy, has DROPPED due to the high price of Gasoline.

While the 1991 recession was technically over in 8 months, unemployment continue to raise till June 1992, and contributed to Clinton's election that year:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_1990s_recession_in_the_United_States

The 1991 Recession lead to RIOTS in Britain:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_1990s_recession_in_the_United_States

In the United Kingdom, there was a significant wave of rioting at the height of the recession in 1991 and 1992, with unemployment and social discontent being seen as major factors. Areas affected including Handsworth in Birmingham, Blackbird Leys in Oxford, Kates Hill in Dudley, Meadow Well on Tyneside, Ely in Cardiff and Hartcliffe in Bristol

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_1990s_recession

Recovery from a recession has changed since 1980. while the 1981 recession followed the course of most post WWII recessions, the 1980 Recession set a pattern that has been followed by every other recession since 1980 (Except for the 1981 recession), that included a very slow recovery.

http://www.minneapolisfed.org/publications_papers/studies/recession_perspective/

Crime rate is up, for the first time in 20 years (No mention that it is the worse recession since the Great Depression):
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/10/17/victims-report-violent-crime/1638895/

Comment in 2001, before the recent spike in violent crime (i.e. Crime goes up in recessions, through it seems to be a "Lag indicator" like unemployment, which shows how the economy was doing 12-18 months before):

“This is actually a pretty significant drop, which is fascinating because we’d normally expect crime to go up when we’re in an economic downturn,”

The US Murder rate climbed in the 1960s, but jumped and peaked after oil start to rise around 1970and continue during the 1973 Recession AND the 1973 Oil Embargo, the resumed its decline till 1979 and the 1979 Iran Oil Crisis followed by the 1980 recession. Then declined till the hard times under Bush I (and the resulting 1990 recession), and a slow decline every since. Notice the decline reversed during the oil crisis of 1970-1973 (1970 was when oil start to go up from about 25 cents a gallon to 35 cents a gallon, it then jumped to 75 cents a gallon after the 1973 oil embargo). This increase continued under the "Recovery" from the 1973 Recession, then reversed and went into decline till 1979 oil crisis and the 1980 and 1981 Recessions. The murder rate then resumed its decline till the 1990 recession. Notice the reversal of the decline occurred as the recession was in the recovery phase, or the phase when the economy is no longer going down, but unemployment is still going up. It is when Unemployment starts to decline that the murder rate starts to go down.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/06/11/12170947-fbi-violent-crime-rates-in-the-us-drop-approach-historic-lows?lite

Tough economic times leads to depression and thoughts of suicide AND a demand for radical action to solve the problem (Which includes acts of violence), while auto use, to to lack of funds decline. Thus the reason for the decline in auto deaths and the increase in firearms deaths may not be anything more then economics.

[The Magistrate]

26. Quite Possibly, Sir, there Is An Economic Element To the Trend

[happyslug]

36. Quit calling me "Sir" I work for living

Old statement told to me by Sergeants. "Sir" is reserved to Officers, when and if you have to deal with them (Officers are also the 1% of the Army, through today Officers make up one out of every 5.3 people serving in the Military or 19%, during WWII it was one out of 10 or 10%).

I bring this up, for several reports indicate these ratio are to high, effective armies have 1:33 Officers to men ratios, for the simple reason it permits the enlisted ranks to do their jobs, while the officers are busy trying to make sure the unit is effectively interacting with other units and higher command levels. With to many officers, you end up with to many people trying to work with other units, instead of getting the actual unit to do what it is suppose to do.

A report in PDF format
pogoarchives.org/m/ns/officers_briefing.ppt

In HTML format (different report)
http://www.g2mil.com/shrinkofficers.htm

[onehandle]

4. Reality has a well-known Liberal bias. nt

[Atypical Liberal]

6. Cars are ever-more-engineered to be safer. Guns are ever-more-engineered to be deadlier.

No surprise here.

[Ed Suspicious]

21. Very good. n/t

[truthisfreedom]

7. I may have to stop driving my gun to work.

This is just getting to be too much. I'm going to miss that stock and receiver between my legs. It's going to be hard to go back to a steering wheel after holding that hot barrel for so many miles.

[toby jo]

8. If these 32 murders/day were due to a mysterious disease, we'd be on it

like shit on a shingle.

'Massive funds being diverted', 'Experts being consulted', 'Oversight being enacted', etc.

32 deaths a day - oh but it's just our collective social disease. Hey, maybe we should ban assault weapons. Thanks for putting a teeny, tiny dent in the overall pic, U Sam.

I rejoined the Brady Campaign. What else to do?

[antigop_1980cali]

9. this news isn't surprising to me imo

Though I'm sure the gun lobby will look the other day, regardless

[xchrom]

10. Du rec. Nt

[Ikonoklast]

12. What does the race of the victims have to do with anything?

Yoiur racism is showing, Gunner.

[Raine1967]

15. Your post is so full of fail, I don't even know whereto begin.

Aside from your racist observation, can you please tell me how suicide by gun makes anything better? You sound like you are making excuses.

Good day.

[slackmaster]

17. This will not end well.

[mainer]

20. Seeing as car ownership is probably upwards of 90% of US families

and those families use their vehicles almost every day, that's a pretty stark statistic revealing how deadly guns are.

[FailureToCommunicate]

35. Very good point!

[Doctor_J]

41. Actually the number of guns will probably exceed the number of cars,

if it hasn't already.

What a country!

[Dems to Win]

25. Just another day in Second Amendment America. Land of of the Bloodthirsty

[bongbong]

29. Slight correction to your title

Should be "Just another day in mis-interpreted Second Amendment America. Land of fear-filled Delicate Flowers"

[Dems to Win]

33. Thanks for the correction!

[Janspece]

31. Total Garbage Dude

[ManiacJoe]

32. If you don't want to come across as a newby troll,

then you are going to need to be more verbose and actually refute something.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

39. And how?

On edit, never mind, you've been tombstoned.

[NickB79]

37. Some of this appears to be due to rising suicide rates

For example: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/05/health/us-suicide-rate-rose-during-recession-study-finds.html?_r=0

In the report, which appeared Sunday on the Web site of The Lancet, a medical journal, researchers found that the rate between 2008 and 2010 increased four times faster than it did in the eight years before the recession. The rate had been increasing by an average of 0.12 deaths per 100,000 people from 1999 through 2007. In 2008, the rate began increasing by an average of 0.51 deaths per 100,000 people a year. Without the increase in the rate, the total deaths from suicide each year in the United States would have been lower by about 1,500, the study said.

The finding was not unexpected. Suicide rates often spike during economic downturns, and recent studies of rates in Greece, Spain and Italy have found similar trends. The new study is the first to analyze the rate of change in the United States state by state, using suicide and unemployment data through 2010.

It appears the Great Recession has played a sizable role in this as well, something I didn't see mentioned much in the Yahoo article.

[Dokkie]

43. And just in addition

to the suicides brought about by the bad economy, you still have to correct for the suicides from all those soldiers coming back from the middle east. That is before you correct for the drug gang violence brought to you by Uncle Sam's war on drugs.

[Doctor_J]

40. One stoopid talking point bites the dust

Now about those bombs & baseball bats...

[Bacchus4.0]

42. ban cars and traffic fatalities will be nearly eliminated n/t

s