Kiss Kiss Bang Bang: Handgun Ownership Rising Most Quickly Among Women

Posted: September 22, 2016 | Author: Pundit Planet | Filed under: Guns and Gadgets, Health and Social Issues, Self Defense, Think Tank | Tags: 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting, 2nd amendment, American Journal of Public Health, Civil Rights, Concealed carry, Concealed carry in the United States, Firearm, Gun rights, Handgun, Harvard, Public health, Self-defense, Texas, Women |1 Comment

The almost amusing part of the report, however, was the seeming shock registered by the people at Harvard involved in the study.

Jazz Shaw writes: We hear repeated stories of how gun ownership is on the rise, but who are the people buying the guns? (We’re talking about legal purchases here obviously. The motives and opportunities for criminals are another issue.) It’s a complicated question because there is no “generic” lawful gun owner in the United States.

[Read the full story here, at Hot Air]

But Time Magazine is looking at one particular segment of American gun owners this week and it’s women who purchase a single firearm… specifically handguns. And the most common reason given is self-defense.

According to a new survey by public health officials at Harvard and Northeastern universities, women are more likely than men to report owning a gun for protection. The research, conducted in 2015 but previously unpublished, was recently obtained by The Guardian and The Trace.

The data shows that, compared to men, American women are more likely to own a single handgun (as opposed to multiple guns). And as fewer men purchase guns, the proportional presence of female gun-owners is on the rise. Forty-three percent of individuals who own just a handgun are women, with almost a quarter of those women living in urban areas. The Guardian noted that female gun-owners were more likely to live in urban areas than their male counterparts, and called the data “the most definitive survey of US gun ownership in two decades.”

A couple of decades ago this might have been seen as a shocking trend, but in 2016 it seems rather obvious. Men have been buying guns in larger numbers for a long time, but shifts in the social paradigm have made it far more common for women to catch up in this area. As more and more ladies join the ranks of gun owners, clearly their cut of the consumer pie is going to go up, though surging to more than 40% was a bit of a surprise even for me.

The almost amusing part of the report, however, was the seeming shock registered by the people at Harvard involved in the study…(read more)

Source: Hot Air