Gun related death stats often cite suicide, death by cop, and accidental shootings. These three are dubiously cited in most gun stats, but only blur the real cause and effect of any simple graph for the use of any argument for and against the ownership of guns. A previous comment explains this. Gun related deaths were on the decline, but not any more than pre ban or post ban, merely on the decline, hence their is no way to support that any measure of gun control has had a positive relationship on the decline without having a dramatic decline in gun related deaths as opposed to just a declining death rate by gun. Your graph simply indicates two things. 1. gun related deaths before the ban were already on the decline, and 2. that those deaths after still maintained a solid rate, although declining. Not enough to make a case for the proposal of banning the ownership of all guns. If there were a dramatic space between two lines after the gun ban, then possibly the cause and effect relationship could be explained. There is not !!

Here in the United States, there is without a doubt NO cause and effect relationship between those city’s, states and county’s that have stricter gun laws, or total gun bans. In fact, Washington D.C. is the toughest gun control district in the United States, yet has more crime and gun related deaths than any other city in the entire United States. Where is the cause and effect relationship in Washington D.C. ?? The answer is simple, there is none !! Crime is deeper than guns. Unemployment, race relations, drug trafficing, poor parental skills, and the “NO HOPE” attitude of it’s citizens. Hence the reasons that gun related deaths often or almost alway’s have a cause and effect relationship with drugs, high school drop out rate, race relations, and a whole host of other social ills that plague the city.

I live in Kentucky. Arguably one of the highest rates of gun ownership in the country and we’ve had ONE murder in the last 3 years in my county alone. That murder was a marital dispute due to infidelity. There have been NO gun related deaths as of January 1, 2007

The estimate here is that each house hold has 2.3 guns with a rise in gun purchases in the county of 23.4% each year since 2003. We have almost no gun related deaths, and suicides that have been reported this year are of drug overdose, or hanging. How is it that we can own more guns than the entire country of Australia in one county in Kentucky and have that few gun related deaths ? it’s easy. Socially, everyone, or almost every one is employed, have at least a high school education, we are predominatley white, are county churches are filled each sunday morning, be it Catholic, Protestant, or Baptish, and our schools have a no tolerance policy for drug abuse and crime. Socially, we are what I like to refer to as “God Fearing” fearing people, educated, financially stable, and almost all white.

http://www.ic-wish.org/Baker%20and%20McPhedran%20Review%20and%20Critique%20of%20Chapman%20et%20al.pdf

That graph that you showed indicates almost no difference pre, and post-buyback. In both cases, the trend was downwards, with what seems to be the same slope. The drop at buyback seems to be the same size as a drop that occurred in the late 80’s.

I would think that statistically, you can’t infer anything from that graph, except that before buyback, the gun death rate was trending down, and after buyback, it was trending down at about the same rate.

Based on the slope of the pre-buyback trend, adding an extra 4 years would result in the same gun death rate as the buyback.