Brief Analysis of Gun Deaths in the United States

First, I pulled up Population Density so I could weigh it directly against Guns per Capita, I figured there would be an interesting relationship. I was right.

Pretty intuitive, that those with the highest population densities have less guns per capita. The little guy all the way to the right is New Jersey of all places.

Anyway, I personally don't think owning a gun is inherently bad or anything- but a strong argument can be made that states who have less guns per capita than expected (trend line) might have a better culture, specifically regarding gun use. The one in the bottom left is Hawaii!

I mentioned that this graph doesn't speak on any large issue in the US, but I think comparing the actual deaths themselves directly to gun ownership can help paint a conclusion on their relationship.

Yeah, not a surprise either.

However, I feel as though this disproves the major proponent argument in favor of gun ownership, being "guns can help secure safety for your family". On a base level, sure- purchasing a gun would only be helpful for protection so long as someone else has a gun. This creates a feedback loop that just accelerates the need for more guns. Ideally, if you ask everyone to lay down their arms, you can retain that safety (due to less gun violence, as shown in the graph) without accelerating the need for more people to arm themselves.

This just looks painfully obvious that guns = gun deaths. Its deplorable when the same people who champion 'gun rights' are the same to ask me, and others who argue against ownership, to pray for the families of victims of such violence. They are deliberately NRA-funded nepo babies and have successfully deceived impressionable voters into voting against their interests.

Anyway, back to a 'fun' note, I wanted to see which states do a better job of their gun death rates compares to where they should have landed according to the line of best fit, as shown above.

This graph is just "high number = better than expected". This is a lot less divided based on the direct comparisons I did previously, and the only notable opinion I have of this is that states on the left should really consider similar gun policies to the states on the left.

Less Death = Good. I value a human over a Glock.

Anyway, I could analyze this further and get more political with it, and look into the actual policies and other variables that help Vermont and those that hurt New Mexico. This is the first time I've sat and done my own analysis, hope you enjoyed. Let me know if you want to see more, have an awesome week!

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Sources and Equations:

Population = https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/decennial/2020/data/apportionment/apportionment-2020-table02.pdf

Area = https://web.archive.org/web/20180316004512/https://www.census.gov/geo/reference/state-area.html

Population Density = Population / Area (mi^2)

Guns/100 = https://ammo.com/articles/gun-ownership-by-state

Gun Deaths/100k = https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/firearm_mortality/firearm.htm

Expected Gun Deaths/100k = (0.376*(Guns/100))-0.822 (Line of Best Fit in Graph 2)

Expected Gun Death Difference = Expected Gun Deaths/100k - Gun Deaths/100k