[adventured]

"Americans are the most heavily armed people in the world per capita. According to a CNN report on July 23, 2012, there were an estimated 270 million guns in the hands of civilians in the U.S. and more than 100,000 people were shot by guns each year. In 2010, there were more than 30,000 deaths caused by firearms."

There are roughly 11,000 gun based murders each year in the US. The US doesn't first have a gun violence problem, it has a black poverty problem mixed with horrible drug laws that drive it all.

The rate of gun homicide for blacks is 15/100k. For Asians it's 1/100k, for whites it's 2/100k. It's almost a 700% greater likelihood that you're going to be murdered by gun if you're black than white. If you fix the black poverty problem, and fix the drug laws, the rate of gun homicides would plunge off a cliff.

And besides, Switzerland is as heavily armed per capita as the US is, and they do not have a rampant gun homicide problem. The reason the US does, is explained by poverty and drug laws.

Also worth noting: the US homicide rate is roughly the lowest it has been in 50 to 60 years. If it continues to fall as it has been, it'll be back to levels not seen since the 19th century. Not to beat a dead horse, but fix the drug laws and America would be exceptionally low on the homicide per capita scale.

http://extranosalley.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/1homicid...

[b6]

I'm not disagreeing, but there's one thing I don't understand. China has more poor people, and their poor are poorer, and their drug laws are as bad as the US's, if not worse. If the problem is just poverty and drug laws, shouldn't we see more violence in China?

[adventured]

It's poverty + drug laws + guns, that is the killer cocktail. You can't hardly come up with a worse combination.

China has violence, but they don't have much gun violence because 1) guns are often beyond the financial capabilities of their poor, and 2) there aren't very many guns per capita.

In the US it isn't difficult to come up with $150 if you're poor and want a black market gun. The US poverty line for a household of 1 starts at $11,500 (it goes without saying how much higher that is than most incomes in China, so the availability of cash to buy a gun for even someone that's poor is radically higher in the US).

A good example of this in action is Brazil. Their gun homicide rate is twice that of the US. They have some intense poverty and guns, and thus have a very high gun homicide rate (eg compared to China, that just has poverty but limited guns).

Also it's fair to say, to top it off, that the US has a far more violent culture in general than China, that amplifies the problem. I'm not speaking of state sponsored violence mind you.