About book More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime And Gun Control Laws (2000)
One of my sons-in-law is an Aussie, and shares the currently (though not historically) typical British/Canadian/Australian horror of civilian gun ownership, and particularly of civilian gun use in self-defense. Since my views on the subject are very dissimilar, we have some interesting discussions. :-) (As Christians, we both would prefer a world where nobody owned weapons, nor wanted or needed any --but that's unfortunately not the case in the world we're stuck with.) When the library where I work discarded this edition in favor of the recent new one, I took it to give to him, but decided to read it first.My decision not to finish reading the book wasn't based on any disparagement of Lott's methodology or conclusions; on the contrary, I think that in its way, it's a solid contribution to the ongoing debate about "gun control," at least for those middle-ground folks for whom the debate isn't about moral first principles, but a pragmatic one about the perceived balances of social benefits and social costs. Obviously, to those who regard lethal self-defense as morally wrong, and/or as an existential threat to the existence of State and social order, preventing it is a moral duty, just as the prevention of cannibalism would be, regardless of any nutritional benefits that might be claimed for it. But for those who don't view lethal self- defense as a priori morally equivalent to cannibalism, the conclusions of this study are important empirical evidence bearing on the social benefits of civilian gun ownership -- which is why I departed here from my normal practice of not writing any "review" of a book I haven't read completely.However, while most people would enjoy a drink of cool water from a well, few enjoy chewing on the rope tied to the bucket. The conclusions of many landmark statistical studies may be likened to a bracing drink of healthy clear water for policymakers and citizens, but the technical mathematical operations of the study and data analysis have more in common with the rope and bucket; and a heavy dose of the latter is what's offered here along with the conclusions. Lott is a Univ. of Chicago social scientist steeped in the rigorous statistical method of the modern academic world, and writing largely for that milieu; he was determined to make the study and analysis methodologically impeccable. He succeeded in that; by the canons of social science, his work is impervious to objective criticism for the most part, which is what makes it valuable as a policy resource. As a book for lay people, however, it also makes it deadly dull, heavy reading; what I read left me glassy-eyed. If you're a Math major specializing in statistical method, who just loves page after page of tables and graphs and would look forward to an appendix explaining "statistical significance" and "regression coefficients," then I could confidently recommend this book to you. If you're more like the rest of us, I wouldn't!
In this book, the economist John Lott stirs the pot by asking some tough questions. He's more interested in what the data says when it comes to the following questions: Will gun control increase or decrease the number of lives lost? Will these laws improve or degrade the quality of life when it comes to violent crime?Considering the title of the book, I'm sure you can take a guess as to what his research findings conclude. Despite mounds of sound empirical evidence, opponents of guns can't seem to fathom the idea that more gun ownership may in fact reduce crime. There is also the aft forgotten Second Amendment (Amendment II) to the United States Constitution which is an important piece of the debate. The problem, of course, is that it's far easier to argue against guns using a fallacious argument that appeals strictly to emotion. Parts of this book are worth reading, but I'm skeptical of some of the econometric techniques that were used to support the author's claims.
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This book is very important and it's also very hard to read unless you're a statistician. Serious scientific researches on dependencies between gun control laws and crime are very rare and this one definitely stands out. However as mentioned 2/3 of the book is filled with specific data tables, methods and conclusions and is beyond the level of an average reader. My suggestion is to read the beginning of the book where John Lott summarizes his research, talks about substitution theory etc, skim the middle and then read the ending where he updates his results with latest research and responds to the criticism.All in all, this book/research makes a lot of pro gun-control people very uncomfortable and at the same it's a science which is very hard to argue with.
—Alex
This is not a fun book to read. The book reads like a very long academic journal article. Sometimes Lott uses statistical jargon that I did not understand, he would even draw opposite conclusions that I would based on looking at the same data. That being said, I think his analysis is pretty good. The amount of data he has canvassed is impressive, and I think that his conclusions are compelling. I'm still not going to go out and buy a gun. But at least I'm more open minded towards loosened gun control laws.
—Michael
This book has a really good point (non-discretionary concealed weapons permits reduce violent crime) and really good evidence, but it reads like a journal article so it was not pleasant to read through. There has got to be a better way to pitch this information - maybe The Bias Against Guns: Why Almost Everything You've Heard About Gun Control Is Wrong is the one I'm looking for. I was expecting something that was a lot easier to read, like Freedomnomics: Why the Free Market Works and Other Half-Baked Theories Don't, all by the same author.
—Jacob
