Concealed Carry Laws Decrease Violent Crime

My RefutationsIn his introduction and the argument on research, my opponent cited the National Research Council. It claims that 17 out of 18 of its panel members are not convinced by the research and conclude that there is no existing credible evidence that CCW decreases crime. However, the paper never said Lott was wrong. They said that no firm conclusions can be made. [1]That is not the whole story. NRC findings actually prove Dr. Lott to be correct. Here is part of that:"A dissenting addendum from James Q. Wilson on this subject concludes that right-to-carry laws "impose no costs but may confer benefits." He points out that the panel's criticisms of the work of AEI scholar John Lott, who first provided data that suggest right-to-carry laws reduce crime and especially murder, are overblown. The panel in fact confirmed Lott's findings in relation to murder, and admitted that the work of Lott's critics had not been subject to the same close analysis as his own." [2]Lott then made a response to the NRC findings:"Based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, a survey that covered 80 different gun-control measures and some of its own empirical work, the panel couldn't identify a single gun-control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide or accidents."He goes on to say: "The study was not the work of gun-control opponents: The panel was set up during the Clinton administration, and all but one of its members (whose views on guns were publicly known before their appointments) favored gun control." And: "The panel also ignored most of the studies that find a benefit in crime reduction from right-to-carry laws. It did pay attention to some non-peer reviewed papers on the right-to-carry issue, and it also noted one part of a right-to-carry study that indicated little or no benefit from such laws. What the panel didn't point out, however, is that the authors of that particular study had concluded that data in their work did much more to show there were benefits than to debunk it." So the conclusion is that my opponent's study is flawed for not looking objectively at all the evidence, an overwhelming majority of pro-gun control members, and that the panel actually ignored many studies proving that gun control fails and actually may be counterproductive. [3]Next, my opponent brings up a 2009 paper conducted by Professors Ayres and Donahue. However, their study has not been replicated and it seems that the majority of the studies rule in favor of CCW. [4]Also, I will mention that under 2009 Donahue:"The most conservative estimates show that adopting these so-called "shall issue" or nondiscretionary permit laws reduced murders by 8%, rapes by 5%, aggravated assaults by 7 %, and robbery by 3 %. To put it another way, if those states which did not have concealed handgun laws in 1992 had adopted them, citizens in those states would have avoided suffering approximately 1500 murders, 4200 rapes, over 60,000 aggravated assaults, and 12,000 robberies. Criminals do apparently respond to deterrence." [5]His theory that CCW causes violence is false."Licensees were 5.7 times less likely to be arrested for violent offenses than the general public - 127 per 100,000 population versus 730 per 100,000.Licensees were 14 times less likely to be arrested for nonviolent offenses than the general public - 386 per 100,000 population versus 5,212 per 100,000.Further, the general public is 1.4 times more likely to be arrested for murder than licensees, and no licensee had been arrested for negligent manslaughter." [6]How can CCW cause more crime if the permit holders are extremely law abiding?1) No permit holder has used his weapon improperly on school grounds, ever.2) In Florida, only 0.01% have had their permit revoked--178--almost always for accidentally bringing it into a forbidden area (like a post office). 3) ANY type of firearms revoke (accidental discharge, usually) is rare. "The behavior of permit holders is the easiest question to answer. And Florida is not unusual. The third edition of More Guns, Less Crime presents detailed data for 25 right-to-carry states, and any type of fire- arms-related violation is at hundredths or thousandths of one per- cent."Arguing it increases aggravation is unlikely, these permit holders are the most law abiding minority in the country. [4]My opponent then discussed Chicago and that its raising crime rates are because of CCW laws. This is untrue."In Chicago, very few new guns have been allowed and that gun ownership is essentially restricted to relatively well to do areas (see below). Yet it is the poorest parts of the city where crime is the worst and where people need guns the most for self protection. One would thus expect a much bigger change in crime rates from the Heller than the McDonald decisions. Still, for Chicago, the change in the law has not had the bad effect that many had predicted."This is true, crime has in fact gone down overall in Chicago rather than up.Regarding the Other FactorsDr. Lott's studies have regressions controlling for variables. Despite the NRC being doubtful of Dr. Lott (no conclusion if you read it, but Wilson--a leading criminologist-- says Dr. Lott is correct. The NRC data actually proves Dr. Lott's data correct. [7]ConsensusMy opponent has argued that there is no consensus that CCW laws create positive results. This is untrue. Many studies use Dr. Lott's same data and technique. If he was correct, then the other studies would show similar results. Eighteen studies find that CCW laws lower crime, ten find it having no effect, and only one shows an increase in crime. Other studies using different results (like Helland and Tabarrok 2004) still replicate. Look here: '1) Florenz Plassmann and Nicolaus Tideman find that "right-to-carry laws do help on average to reduce the number of these crimes." 2) Carl Moody explains that his findings "confirm and reinforce the basic findings of the original Lott and Mustard study."'This is just a few out of many studies findings that replicate.ADZMy opponent has cited this ADZ study, but please note it has coding errors:"1) The observations for county 2060 in Alaska are repeated 73 times for 1996. .2) The first full year of the shall-issue law for Kansas is coded as 1996 when in fact the law was not passed until 2006.3) The first full year of the shall-issue law for Florida is coded as 1989 when in fact the law was passed in 1987.4) The first full year of the shall-issue law for South Dakota is coded as 1987, however the law was passed in 1985." [7]Note, The NRC and Dr. Lott had similar results. ADZ said no, look at ours. But the only reason their was different was because of the errors, "As can be seen from the last three columns in Table 1, it is the change in the specification, not these errors in the ADZ data set that prevented them from replicating the NRC estimates." When correcting for the errors, their results disappear. ConlusionI have proven that my opponent's NRC study actually helps, rather than hinders, Dr. Lott's studies. His ADZ study has coding errors. His 2009 paper study has not been not replicated. Crime is actually overall going down. There is consensus proving this. CCW laws create positive effects. Vote Pro!Sources1. http://www.nber.org...2. http://johnrlott.tripod.com...3. http://www.aei.org...4. http://www.law.umaryland.edu...5. http://scholar.valpo.edu...6. http://www.ncpa.org...7. http://marylandshallissue.org...