Blog 8/08/22

The Heritage Foundation: What Economists Can’t Tell You About The Costs Of Gun Violence


It does not take an economist to tell you that gun violence imposes a tremendous economic burden every year, or that lawful gun ownership is largely not to blame for the bulk of it. To any extent that lawful gun ownership does facilitate the costs of gun violence, it offers an equally significant protective value in the form of crime interference and deterrence, as well as through the economic value of a lawful multi-billion-dollar industry. This is, at its core, a very old conversation about gun policy, with the same easily refuted gun control talking points from the same advocates. It is far past time for Congress to stop having these same tired discussions focusing on the same utterly ineffective “solutions,” and to start actually implementing policies that will address the underlying problems that lead Americans to kill themselves and others with firearms in the first place.

Read the full report from The Heritage here.