Comparing guns per capita on a small sampling, the top 5 most violent states per one survey are Louisiana (gun ownership: #11), Alaska (gun ownership: #1), Tennessee (gun ownership: #15), Delaware (gun ownership: #51), and Nevada (gun ownership: #16). All over the place, at least so far. Maybe a small bias towards "more guns=more violence per capita", but with such a huge outlier with Delaware, that makes me imagine that the overall data is pretty noisy.
My impression is that there is a much stronger indicator of guns-per-capita: population density. The top 5 guns per capita states are: Alaska (population density: #50), Arkansas (population density: #40), Idaho (population density: #44), West Virginia (population density: #29), Wyoming (population density: #49). Again, somewhat messy, but there seems like a strong bias towards more rural areas.
This makes sense to me. In America, a driving force for many people with guns is less pure self defense and more sport and recreation. Of which the opportunities are quite a bit more readily available in rural areas.
Comparing guns per capita on a small sampling, the top 5 most violent states per one survey are Louisiana (gun ownership: #11), Alaska (gun ownership: #1), Tennessee (gun ownership: #15), Delaware (gun ownership: #51), and Nevada (gun ownership: #16). All over the place, at least so far. Maybe a small bias towards "more guns=more violence per capita", but with such a huge outlier with Delaware, that makes me imagine that the overall data is pretty noisy.
My impression is that there is a much stronger indicator of guns-per-capita: population density. The top 5 guns per capita states are: Alaska (population density: #50), Arkansas (population density: #40), Idaho (population density: #44), West Virginia (population density: #29), Wyoming (population density: #49). Again, somewhat messy, but there seems like a strong bias towards more rural areas.
This makes sense to me. In America, a driving force for many people with guns is less pure self defense and more sport and recreation. Of which the opportunities are quite a bit more readily available in rural areas.
[1] https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2016/07/29/ame... [2] https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/gun-ownership-rates-by-stat... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territ...