Gun Reform: Policies People Support
By: Hari Seldon
Tags: Biden, Public Policy, Trump, Shooting, Guns

As we wait for a Biden administration to begin, barring some sort of constitutional upset that’s nearly impossible to imagine, ~39,000 Americans are dying every day due to firearms. To put that in perspective, and based on 2018 statistics, at least 4 Americans are killed every hour by a firearm. Over 24,000 of those deaths are suicides, which may have become more likely due to the ongoing pandemic. Gun death rates have been depressingly consistent:

While these numbers are not as high as deaths due to disease or due to opioids, gun policy is one of the least understood areas of debate between the two major parties, and is often reduced to emotional appeals about the Second Amendment and “taking away our guns”, or “common sense” reform that will “save the children”. The fact that politicians are paralyzed on how to proceed on the issue has let the gun violence epidemic continue. Yet Americans have areas of agreement they can reach that make plenty of sense, and perhaps the same is true of politicians.

The Platitudes: Popular Support on Party Lines

The two major political parties have extraordinarily divergent views on guns, and also on what the other party supports. The Trump administration has not tightened gun control in measurably significant ways, and obviously a majority of Republican politicians do not seem to want to do so either. While some notable exceptions exist (i.e. the Trump “bump stock” ban issued in response to the Las Vegas shooting), these policies are the exceptions that prove the rule. Unfortunately, the Trump campaign did not put out a policy platform for 2016, and has been somewhat unclear on if it would take any policies at all had it won the 2020 election. However, President Trump did mention that he was a supporter of the Second Amendment, which ordinarily would mean nothing, but is often taken as a sign that one is anti-tightening gun policy. The Trump campaign certainly drew a contrast from President-elect Biden in their messaging, if not their policy statements.

Biden’s campaign, unlike Trump’s, issued a long list of policy preferences related to gun control. His policies, and some of the problems with them, are as follows:

The list of policies continues, but the basic point should be clear: some of the policies are sensible, while others are poison pills that will do little. So long as the parties are as generally far apart as they are on major issues, policies that are impossible to pass should take a backseat.

The American People Agree on Some Policies

While it’s hard to find American support for many policy solutions that cross the aisle on most areas of debate, both parties have majority support for a few general policies. Those policies include:

Some of these policies are already largely in place at the state level, like preventing gun purchases by those with mental illnesses. However, some states lack statutes on the books (or have unclear ones) and others allow purchases so long as a person was not involuntarily committed to a mental health facility (in line with existing federal law). If a person was voluntarily admitted to a facility, or is in outpatient treatment, they are not prohibited from purchase, even though a simple question to their attending psychiatrist might help avert disaster. In the Colorado shooting case, though the psychiatrist reported James Holmes was a threat, requiring an affirmative OK from the psychiatrist to purchase guns first would have likely prevented the purchase and also alerted police more effectively to the threat.

A majority of Americans support some level of reform to this policy, overwhelmingly. A majority also support requiring universal background checks, and a slimmer majority (but still one) of Republicans themselves support a gun license system and ban on magazines that hold more than 10 rounds.

These Policies Are Better Than Nothing

These policies could help limit the deaths of Americans to firearms, without meaningfully infringing on the Second Amendment. Requiring background checks can help narrow the avenues for sales of guns to improper parties. If a law-abiding gun owner wants to sell a gun to a friend, they can do so without checking if the friend is actually legally able to own one. Over 90% of those in prison who had a weapon when they committed their crime got said weapons from a non-retail source, i.e. a friend or family. Requiring background checks can help law-abiding gun owners avoid giving guns to the mentally ill, criminals, and the like, and those who don’t comply can be held liable for the illegal sale (deterring future illegal sales). Banning magazines over 10 rounds could limit the number of deaths in mass shooting events, or at least make it harder for criminals to obtain those magazines; this policy would save at least some lives, which is sensible considering the low cost it entails.

This chart shows that an uptick in requests slows the system; if we are going to add more background checks we must fund the system commensurately.

Smarter restrictions on potentially mentally ill buyers can help prevent mass shootings (which, to be fair, are a tiny percentage of deaths nationwide), and also help prevent and decrease the number of gun suicides and homicides. Requiring gun licensing can help slow the trickle of guns into the hands of criminals and make those guns easier to track. All of this, of course, must be paired with funding from Congress to make the system work more smoothly, so that background checks are adequately conducted and within a reasonable timeframe.

None of these policies is going to fix all gun violence. Some may save only a fraction of the lives lost each year. In some cases, those who would have used a gun for suicide will use another method. Some will still be able to obtain high-capacity magazines and use them. Some will still be able to get guns illicitly. The point is not to end deaths, but to reduce them with low-cost policies that most people can accept, even if they’re imperfect. Given they carry very low costs, relatively speaking, and they can save lives, there is little reason to delay. And if they don’t save lives, so be it; at least we can say we tried before reverting them, rather than the current strategy of doing nothing. When it comes to actual common-sense gun reform, the kind that is widely supported within both parties despite imperfections, America should act sooner rather than later.