This may be dependant on the state at hand here (geographical area of residency). Within states that have looser gun laws it appears the majority of offenders acquire their firearms legally.
“Our findings indicate that 40% of offenders incarcerated for committing crimes with a gun in the 13 US states with the least strict standards for legal firearm purchase and possession were in possession of the gun illegally.”
This certainly isn’t a minority, granted the study size isn’t massive comparative to the actual populace incarcerated… Only looking at fourteen thousand inmates.
Another generalised study which I can’t exactly link here because it’s a PDF looks over state/federal inmates (mass amounts)… Only 45% of those who acquired guns/were involved within gun crime had sourced the weapons through the black market, it certainly isn’t the minority.
If we look at mass shootings excluding drugs, domestic violence, gangs/ anything other than say some deranged asshole opening fire in a public place
Is appears 74% of them got their guns legally. Whilst America has a high rate of gun violence, they certainly aren’t the worst out of all countries of which we have data for… Not by a long shot
“The U.S. gun death rate was 10.6 per 100,000 people in 2016, the most recent year in the study, which uses a somewhat different methodology from the CDC. That was far higher than in countries such as Canada (2.1 per 100,000) and Australia (1.0), as well as European nations such as France (2.7), Germany (0.9) and Spain (0.6). But the rate in the U.S. was much lower than in El Salvador (39.2 per 100,000 people), Venezuela (38.7), Guatemala (32.3), Colombia (25.9) and Honduras (22.5), the study found”
Take the fact that in the US 6/10ths of gun deaths are suicides (ratio for other countries I’m unsure of the exact stat) and you’ve got about 6 gun deaths per million people vs Australia’s 1 (keep in mind this has been adjusted for populace, and in Aus factor out suicide and it’s probably lower than 1)
Should also be noted this is what is reported. I’d argue on both ends (Aus and the US) the stats are proportionately higher given we have bikie gangs, mafia etc (in Aus that is)… some of these guys own guns… Not all deaths are going to be reported (i’d assume some just disappear).
Prior to the Port Arthur shooting here the gun death rate was almost 3.5x higher. Regardless, when looking at data pertaining to areas with stricter gun control it’s difficult to argue more regulation (background checks, gun safes etc) shouldn’t be in place.
I’m not on board for Australia’s level of regulation… we take it a bit too far. I’m on board for the kind of scheme you’d see in Canada or New Zealand… I’d also state marijuana related offences (personal use that is) shouldn’t dictate license disqualification… But a violent misdemeanor within the past 10-15 years or so should certainly disqualify one as a candidate. A law abiding citizen should be able to own a gun if they so please… But I don’t believe the answer to curbing gun violence (I’ve been given this argument from a few back when I lived in the US) is for EVERYONE to carry a gun in public.
I can only imagine how this would turn out. With the majority not even trained how to use a gun adequately (as well as not being trained to handle stress in a combat/active shooter style situation) it’d probably be more along the lines of everybody shooting everybody (shooting blindly at whoever has a gun… Which is everyone)