More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws, Third Edition (Studies in Law and Economics) [Paperback]

John R. Lott Jr. (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 24, 2010 | ISBN-10: 0226493660 | ISBN-13: 978-0226493664 | Edition: Third Edition, Third Edition

On its initial publication in 1998, John R. Lott’s More Guns, Less Crime drew both lavish praise and heated criticism. More than a decade later, it continues to play a key role in ongoing arguments over gun-control laws: despite all the attacks by gun-control advocates, no one has ever been able to refute Lott’s simple, startling conclusion that more guns mean less crime. Relying on the most rigorously comprehensive data analysis ever conducted on crime statistics and right-to-carry laws, the book directly challenges common perceptions about the relationship of guns, crime, and violence. For this third edition, Lott draws on an additional ten years of data—including provocative analysis of the effects of gun bans in Chicago and Washington, D.C—that brings the book fully up to date and further bolsters its central contention.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“A compelling book with enough hard evidence that even politicians may have to stop and pay attention. More Guns, Less Crime is an exhaustive analysis of the effect of gun possession on crime rates. . . . Mr. Lott’s book—and the factual arsenals of other pro-gun advocates—are helping to redefine the argument over guns and gun control.”—James Bovard, Wall Street Journal

(James Bovard Wall Street Journal )

“John Lott’s More Guns, Less Crime revives the wisdom of the past by using the latest tools of social science. By constructing careful statistical models and deploying a wealth of crime data he shows that laws permitting the carrying of concealed weapons actually lead to a drop in crime in the jurisdictions that enact them. . . . By providing strong empirical evidence that yet another liberal policy is a cause of the very evil it purports to cure, he has permanently changed the terms of debate on gun control. . . . Lott’s book could hardly be more timely. . . . Lott’s work is a model of the meticulous application of economics and statistics to law and policy.”—John O. McGinnis, National Review

(John O. McGinnis National Review )

About the Author

John R. Lott, Jr., is the author five books, including Freedomnomics and Are Predatory Commitments Credible? Who Should the Courts Believe?, the latter also published by the University of Chicago Press.

Product Details

• Paperback: 472 pages
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press; Third Edition, Third Edition edition (May 24, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0226493660
• ISBN-13: 978-0226493664
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #15,028 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #16 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Current Events > Civil Rights & Liberties
  • #36 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Crime & Criminals  > Criminology

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

100 of 112 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Will DC and Chicago Ever Learn?, May 19, 2010

By 

Cal Skinner - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws, Third Edition (Studies in Law and Economics) (Paperback)

Nine more years of data in this third edition of "More Guns, Less Crime."

When I read the second edition eight years ago, I was pleased that John Lott's hypothesis of the mid-1990's had up held.

After all, it's just common sense that if a potential rapist thought a woman might be able to protect herself with a gun that he would be less likely to attack, being the cowards rapists are.

But the leap from common sense to policy formation sometimes takes facts.

Fortunately, this book is packed with them.

Besides showing that no state that has adopted right-to-carry legislation has seen any of the parade of horribles that opponents trot out occur, the data presented show that crime actually does decrease when people are allowed to carry firearms.

In my own state of Illinois, there was a member of the Armed Forces killed while sitting in the front row of the Northern Illinois University lecture hall when the shooter entered the stage from an outside door and started firing. Lott points out that campus security arrived in six minutes---faster than in any other mass shooting at an institution of higher learning---but that was still not good enough.

Maybe, had NIU not been a protection free zone, she (the soldier was a woman) and others would be alive today.

Perhaps the mayor of Washington, D.C., whom I understand is a fellow graduate of Oberlin College, will read the book and figure out that he could lower his city's crime rate by advocating something no good little Oberlin liberal would ever think would work...unless he or she actually was willing to follow data to their logical policy conclusions.

Not that I think my former legislative colleague, now mayor of Chicago, could make that leap, but, maybe, just maybe, the mayor of Washington can.

The rest of us who read this book will be armed with information to promote a logical "we can protect ourselves when the police aren't around, if policy-makers will let us" policy.

Incidentally, lower hurdles to get a license (in training and dollars) tend to result in larger drops in crime rates.

51 of 58 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Tremendous piece of research, May 12, 2010

By 

Magnum "Magnum" (Maryland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws, Third Edition (Studies in Law and Economics) (Paperback)

Lott's preface to this book is right: nearly a decade has passed since the most recent comprehensive look at effects of gun laws, a period in which fundamental changes have taken place, not least of which the sunset of an "assault weapon" federal law. Understanding the effects of these policy changes is critical, and his book covers it all. Good piece of work and very accessible material!

28 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars This the benefit v cost economics approach, not the constitutional rights approach, August 26, 2010

By 

A.J. Brown - See all my reviews

This review is from: More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws, Third Edition (Studies in Law and Economics) (Paperback)

More Guns, Less Crime 2010 is the third edition of Lott's book originally based on his and David Mustard's Right-To-Carry study of 1997 that measured the result of 22 states going "shall issue" on carry permits for handguns between 1986 and 1996. The first 1998 edition was focussed on the RTC issue.

The 2nd edition 2000 looked at other gun control policies as well, and commented on the controversy that Lott & Mustard 1997 and Lott 1998 engendered in the media and among academics.

Since the 2nd edition 2000, a lot has happened: the CDC 2003 and NAS 2004 reviews on gun laws and gun violence, the sunset of the 1994-2004 federal Assault Weapon Ban, the Supreme Court decision on the Heller case in 2008 (gun ban in DC v Second Amendment), and so on. The 3rd edition 2010 is expanded by about 150 pages to cover these new issues.

I would like to correct an impression that may be created by an earlier reviewer, that Lott's book is a major Second Amendment resource. First, in the 2nd edition there were one sentence and one paragraph in the text and three paragraphs in the footnotes on the Second Amendment out of 300+ pages (Second Admendment issues were "...important issues that are beyond the scope of this book"--Lott at page 168); while the 3rd edition expands somewhat on the Second Amendment, it is not a resource book on the Second Amendment. Secondly, Lott stated in the Oct 2008 NPR debate on guns that his family did not own a gun until his 1996 research convinced him that having a gun was beneficial for self defense within reasonable safety costs. Lott's argument on guns and gun control is based on weighing the economic benefits v the costs of gun ownership and gun control: this is a law and economics argument, not a constitutional law argument. If you are interested in the debate over the benefits and costs of gun ownership and gun laws, this is an important book regardless of your apriori beliefs on the gun issue; if you are interested in the debate over the constitutionality of gun laws, gun rights v gun control, there are books devoted to those subjects. This book is a study of the good v the harm done with guns and by gun laws; it is not a dedicated Second Amendment analysis. Journal of Economic Literature Subject Classification K42 (Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law).