Wellford C.S., Pepper J.V. - Firearms and Violence[c] What Do We Know[q] (2005)(en)

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SUBSTITUTION

Suppose for the sake of discussion that policy interventions can raise the difficulty faced by some individuals in obtaining some types of guns. The question of whether such interventions reduce gun use (or crime or violence) depends on how readily the potential buyers could substitute alternative weapons or sources for those targeted by policy.

In our framework, the existing studies, summarized in the section on how offenders obtain firearms, describe the distribution of guns across acquisition sources for a particular type of buyers (felons or youthful offenders). These surveys cannot provide an estimate of the total number of guns held by the population of offenders.

Although the studies are conducted on nonrandom convenience samples of inmates, they show fairly consistently that many guns are stolen or borrowed, rather than purchased in the primary market. Many guns are obtained through informal networks. The fact that criminals acquire guns from a variety of sources suggests substitution. Indeed, some (see, e.g., Kleck, 1999; Wright and Rossi, 1994; Sheley and Wright, 1995) have taken these studies to suggest that substitution possibilities are so pervasive that interventions cannot control the amount of gun use or ensuing harm. Some observers draw similar inferences from the fact that many guns are stolen from the large stock of guns available to steal.

Our framework, though simple, suggests that there are limits to what one can infer about substitution from these data. First, the existing studies combine survey responses of inmates from a variety of cities. The fact that inmates from various places, taken collectively, get their guns from different sources does not mean that any particular criminal or criminals in any particular city have ready access to all these alternatives. Cities may differ in terms of the sources of guns. Furthermore, even if persons of a particular type in a locale obtain their guns through different channels, this does not imply that each person has a variety of channels if deprived of the channel he or she currently uses.

Another finding in the literature concerns the vintage of guns used in crime. Vintage enters the framework through type: new and old guns may be seen as different types with particular policy relevance because there are different interventions for each type. In spite of the vast numbers of used guns that could be stolen and then transferred to criminals, the trace data suggest that a disproportionate fraction of crime guns are quite new, although, as noted in Chapter 2, it cannot be determined how well the trace data represent the total population of crime guns. In our framework, we can interpret this information to mean that criminals favor new guns over used guns, given current acquisition costs; this reflects in part the fact that new guns lack a potential liability from use in a previous crime that is unknown to the current purchaser. Again, it is only information on the

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distribution of types of guns used by criminals. Since criminals use new guns, some observers have taken this information to indicate that interventions targeting new guns can reduce crime. This is a possible but not a necessary consequence. If both new and old guns are available to criminals, and criminals are observed using new guns, we can infer that criminals prefer new guns to old ones, given the respective prices and difficulties of obtaining the two types of guns. But this fact provides no information about whether criminals would substitute old guns for new ones if they faced increased difficulty of getting new ones.

That different criminals get their guns from a variety of sources—and that many guns used in crime are recent guns—provides little evidence about whether interventions would affect the volume of gun use. This is information about the types of guns used, not about the volume of, or harm caused by, guns. By itself, these findings are consistent with any level of substitution. Suppose that, when local rules are loose, some criminals get guns locally while others get them from elsewhere. The locale then adopts tight rules and suppose that all guns seized thereafter turn out to be nonlocal. That is consistent with either of two contradictory stories. In one, the restriction is totally effective and those who were purchasing local firearms can find none. In the other, there is full substitution; all the local buyers are able to find nonlocal sources without much increase in cost. Any inference requires information about the change in the tendency for the targeted type of individual to purchase other guns relative to those targeted with restrictions. In the language of our framework, we need to know the effects of the restriction on costs and of own costs and other prices on the tendencies for each type of person to buy guns.

INTERVENTIONS TO REDUCE CRIMINAL ACCESS TO FIREARMS

This section summarizes the existing literature on the effects of different kind of access interventions. We do not include taxes on firearms or ammunition because there are no evaluations of either kind of tax.

Regulating Gun Dealers

As already noted, criminals can acquire guns in the primary market by personally making illegal purchases, arranging straw purchases, and by finding corrupt FFLs willing to ignore transfer laws. The available research evidence reveals that a very small number of FFLs generate a large number of crime gun traces (Pierce et al., 1995; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, 2000b). Assuming it is possible to categorize dealers by risk of diversion per weapon, this concentration of crime gun traces suggests an opportunity to reduce the illegal supply of firearms to criminals by focusing limited regulatory and investigative resources on the relatively small group

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of high-risk dealers. In theory, this approach would increase the cost of guns to criminals by restricting their availability through retail outlets. However, in order for this approach to be effective in reducing gun violence, there must be limited substitution from regulated primary markets to unregulated secondary markets.

In their analysis of trace data contained in BATF’s Firearm Tracing System, Pierce et al. (1995) found that nearly half of all traces came back to only 0.4 percent of all licensed dealers. However, the concentration of trace data may simply reflect the very high concentration of firearms sales among FFLs. In California, the 13 percent of FFLs with more than 100 sales during 1996-1998 accounted for 88 percent of all sales (Wintemute, 2000). While handgun trace volume from 1998 was strongly correlated with handgun sales volume at the level of the individual dealer and highly concentrated among high-volume dealers, Wintemute (2000) also found that trace volume varied substantially among dealers with similar sales volumes, suggesting that guns sold by certain dealers were more at risk for generating crime guns than others. However, as Braga and his colleagues (2002) point out, Wintemute did not determine whether this variation was greater than could be explained by chance alone. It is possible that the variation of traces among dealers with similar trace volume was not significantly different from what would be expected from a normal distribution of crime gun traces among dealers.

The findings are important nonetheless. Even if only some high-volume dealers are high risk, the fact that most crime weapons come from highvolume dealers suggests that concentration of regulatory resources on this relatively small population may lead to more efficient enforcement, unless there is substitution across dealers by size category.

Due to concern that some FFLs were scofflaws who used their licenses to supply criminals with guns, the Clinton administration initiated a review of licensing procedures that led to their tightening (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, 2000b). In 1993 and 1994, federal law was amended to provide more restrictive application requirements and a hefty increase in the licensing fee, from $30 to $200 for three years. After these provisions were put into place, the number of federal licensees declined steadily from 284,117 in 1992 to 103,942 in 1999 (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, 2000b). With the elimination of some 180,000 dealers, BATF regulatory and enforcement resources became less thinly spread. In 2000, BATF conducted focused compliance inspections on dealers who had been uncooperative in response to trace requests and on FFLs who had 10 or more crime guns (regardless of time-to-crime) traced to them in 1999 (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, 2000a). The inspections disclosed violations in about 75 percent of the 1,012 dealers inspected. While the majority of the discrepancies were resolved during the

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inspection process, some 13,271 missing guns could not be accounted for by 202 licenses, and 16 FFLs each had more than 200 missing guns. More than half of the licensees had record-keeping violations only. The focused compliance inspections identified sales to more than 400 potential firearms traffickers and nearly 300 potentially prohibited persons, resulting in 691 referrals sent to BATF agents for further investigation (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, 2000a). This reinforces the impression that a relatively small number of dealers systematically violate rules in ways that allow for leakage of guns to prohibited persons.

In a recent paper, Koper (2002) examined the effects of the nearly 70 percent reduction in FFLs following the 1993 and 1994 federal licensing reforms on the availability of guns to criminals. Using a data base of all active gun dealers in summer 1994 and the number of BATF gun traces to each dealer since 1990, Koper examined whether “dropout” dealers were more likely to be suppliers of crime guns than were “survivor” dealers. He concluded that it was not clear whether guns sold by the dropout dealers had a higher probability of being used in crime or moved into criminal channels more quickly when compared with active dealers. This study, however, used national BATF firearms trace data from 1990 through 1995, before the adoption of comprehensive tracing practices in most major cities and prior to BATF nationwide efforts to encourage law enforcement agencies to submit guns for tracing (Cook and Braga, 2001; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, 2000c). National trace data from this time period are not representative of guns recovered by law enforcement, so it is difficult to interpret the findings of Koper’s analysis of the impact of federal licensing reforms on the availability of guns to criminals.

Some states and localities have imposed additional regulations on gun dealers. In 1993, North Carolina found that only 23 percent of dealers also possessed its required state license (Cook et al., 1995). Noncomplying dealers were required to obtain a state license or forfeit their federal license. Alabama also identified FFLs who did not possess the required state license; 900 claimed not to know about the state requirements and obtained the license; another 900 reported that they were not currently engaged in the business of selling firearms; and 200 more could not be located (Cook et al., 1995). Alabama officials scheduled the licenses for these 1,100 dealers for cancellation. The Oakland (CA) Police Department worked with BATF to enforce a requirement for all licensed dealers to hold a local permit that required dealers to undergo screening and a criminal background check (Veen et al., 1997). This effort caused the number of license holders in Oakland to drop from 57 to 7 in 1997. Officials in New York found that only 29 of 950 FFLs were operating in compliance with local ordinances. In cooperation with BATF, all local license applications were forwarded to the New York Police Department, which assumed responsibility for screening

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and inspections. The increased scrutiny reduced the number of license holders in New York from 950 to 259 (Veen et al., 1997).

These state-level and local initiatives have not been rigorously evaluated to determine whether they have affected criminal access to guns and rates of gun misuse.

Limiting Gun Sales

Federal law requires FFLs to report multiple firearms sales to BATF. A few states, including Virginia, Maryland, and California, have passed laws that limit the number of guns that an individual may legally purchase from FFLs within some specified time period. Underlying this intervention is the idea that some individuals make straw purchases in the primary market and then divert these guns to proscribed persons or others planning to do harm. Trace data analyses conducted by BATF suggest that handguns that were first sold as part of a multiple sale are more likely than others to move rapidly into criminal use (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, 2000c). If multiple sales were limited, then the volume of new guns available to criminals might decline. In the language of supply and demand, this is a supply-side intervention aimed at raising the price of new guns to criminals. In principle this sort of intervention holds promise. However, in order for this intervention to work—in the sense of reducing violence—not only must the intervention make it more difficult for criminals to get new guns but also the substitution possibilities must be limited; that is, comparably harmful guns cannot be available from comparably accessible sources.

In July 1993, Virginia implemented a law limiting handgun purchases by any individual to no more than one during a 30-day period. Prior to the passage of this law, Virginia had been one of the leading source states for guns recovered in northeast cities including New York, Boston, and Washington, DC (Weil and Knox, 1996). Using firearms trace data, Weil and Knox (1996) showed that during the first 18 months the law was in effect, Virginia’s role in supplying guns to New York and Massachusetts was greatly reduced. For traces initiated in the Northeast, 35 percent of the firearms acquired before one-gun-a-month implementation took effect and 16 percent purchased after implementation were traced to Virginia dealers (Weil and Knox, 1996). This study indicates a change in the origin of traced crime guns following the change in the law. In this sense, the law change had an effect. However, the law may have been undermined by a substitution from guns first purchased in Virginia to guns first purchased in other states.4 An important question not addressed by this study is whether the

4The Virginia legislature may nonetheless have achieved its goal of reducing the role of the state in the interstate illegal gun trade.

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law change affects the ultimate outcome of interest—the quantity of criminal harm committed with guns—or even the intermediate questions of the law’s effects on the number of guns purchased or owned.

Screening Gun Buyers

Enacted in 1994, the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act required FFLs to conduct a background check on all handgun buyers and mandated a one-week waiting period before transferring the gun to the purchaser. A total of 32 states were required to implement the provisions of the Brady act. The remaining states5 and the District of Columbia were exempted because they already required a background check of those buying handguns from FFLs. In 1998, the background check provisions of the Brady act were extended to include the sales of long guns and the waiting period requirement was removed when, as mandated by the initial act, it became possible for licensed gun sellers to perform instant record checks on prospective buyers. The policy intent was to make gun purchases more difficult for prohibited persons, such as convicted felons, drug addicts, persons with certain diagnosed mental conditions, and persons under the legal age limit (18 for long rifles and shotguns, 21 for handguns). In 1996, the prospective purchasers with prior domestic violence convictions were also prohibited from purchasing firearms from FFLs.

Theoretically, by raising the cost of acquisition, this procedure reduces the supply of guns to would-be assailants and to some persons who might commit suicide. Several BJS studies have demonstrated that Brady background checks have created obstacles for prohibited persons who attempt to purchase a gun through retail outlets (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1999, 2002). The Bureau of Justice Statistics (2002) reported that, from the inception of the Brady act on March 1, 1994, through December 31, 2001, nearly 38 million applications for firearms transfers were subject to background checks and some 840,000 (2.2 percent) applications were rejected. In 2001, 66,000 firearms purchase applications were rejected out of about 2.8 million applications (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2002). Prospective purchasers were rejected because the applicant had a felony conviction or indictment (58 percent), domestic violence misdemeanor conviction or restraining order (14 percent), state law prohibition (7 percent), was a fugitive from justice (6 percent), or some other disqualification, such as having a drug addiction, documented mental illness, or a dishonorable discharge (16 percent) (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2002).

5The 19 remaining states include: California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota, and Virginia.

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These figures suggest the possibility that the Brady act might be effective in screening prohibited purchasers from making gun purchases from FFLs. Based on descriptive studies revealing heightened risks of subsequent gun offending, some researchers suggest extending the provisions of the Brady act to a wider range of at-risk individuals, such as persons with prior felony arrests (Wright et al., 1999) and misdemeanor convictions (Wintemute et al., 1998). Wright et al. (1999) compared the gun arrest rates of two groups in California. The first consisted of persons who were denied purchases because they had been convicted of a felony in 1977. The second was purchasers who had a prior felony arrest in 1977 but no conviction. Even though the former group would reasonably be labeled as higher risk, they showed lower arrest rates over the three years following purchase or attempt to purchase. It is important to recognize that the group of convicted felons who attempt to purchase through legal channels may be systematically lower risk than the entire felony population, precisely because they did attempt to use the prohibited legitimate market; the finding is suggestive rather than conclusive

Wintemute et al. (1998) also recognize that extending the provisions of the Brady act would greatly complicate the screening process. Moreover, while this policy seems to prevent prohibited persons from making gun purchases in the primary market, the question remains what, if any, effect it has on purchases in the secondary market, on gun crimes, and on suicide.

Using a differences-in-differences research design and multivariate statistics to control for state and year effects, population age, race, poverty and income levels, urban residence, and alcohol consumption, Ludwig and Cook (2000) compared firearm homicide and suicide rates and the proportion of homicides and suicides resulting from firearms in the 32 states affected by Brady act requirements (the treatment group) compared with the 19 states and the District of Columbia (the control group) that had equivalent legislation already in place. Ludwig and Cook (2000) found no significant differences in homicide and suicide rates between the treatment and control groups, although they did find a reduction in gun suicides among persons age 55 and older in the treatment states. This reduction was greater in the treatment states that had instituted both waiting periods and background checks relative to treatment states that only changed background check requirements. The authors suggest that the effectiveness of the Brady act in reducing homicides and most suicides was undermined by prohibited purchasers shifting from the primary market to the largely unregulated secondary market.

While the Brady act had no direct effect on homicide rates, it is possible that it had an indirect effect, by reducing interstate gun trafficking and hence gun violence in the control states that already had similar laws. Cook and Braga (2001) document the fact that criminals in Chicago (a

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high control jurisdiction) were being supplied to a large extent by illegal gun trafficking from south central states, in particular Mississippi, and that a modest increase in regulation—imposed by the Brady act—shut down that pipeline. However, this large change in trafficking channels did not have any apparent effect in gun availability for violent acts in Chicago, as the percentage of homicides with guns did not drop after 1994 (Cook and Braga, 2001). Moreover, the authors found that the percentage of crime handguns first purchased in Illinois increased after the implementation of the Brady act, suggesting substitution from out-of-state FFLs to instate FFLs once the advantage of purchasing guns outside Illinois had been removed.

Gun Buy-Backs

Gun buy-back programs involve a government or private group paying individuals to turn in guns they possess. The programs do not require the participants to identify themselves, in order to encourage participation by offenders or those with weapons used in crimes. The guns are then destroyed. The theoretical premise for gun buy-back programs is that the program will lead to fewer guns on the streets because fewer guns are available for either theft or trade, and that consequently violence will decline. It is the committee’s view that the theory underlying gun buy-back programs is badly flawed and the empirical evidence demonstrates the ineffectiveness of these programs.

The theory on which gun buy-back programs is based is flawed in three respects. First, the guns that are typically surrendered in gun buy-backs are those that are least likely to be used in criminal activities. Typically, the guns turned in tend to be of two types: (1) old, malfunctioning guns whose resale value is less than the reward offered in buy-back programs or (2) guns owned by individuals who derive little value from the possession of the guns (e.g., those who have inherited guns). The Police Executive Research Forum (1996) found this in their analysis of the differences between weapons handed in and those used in crimes. In contrast, those who are either using guns to carry out crimes or as protection in the course of engaging in other illegal activities, such as drug selling, have actively acquired their guns and are unlikely to want to participate in such programs.

Second, because replacement guns are relatively easily obtained, the actual decline in the number of guns on the street may be smaller than the number of guns that are turned in. Third, the likelihood that any particular gun will be used in a crime in a given year is low. In 1999, approximately 6,500 homicides were committed with handguns. There are approximately 70 million handguns in the United States. Thus, if a different handgun were used in each homicide, the likelihood that a particular handgun would be

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used to kill an individual in a particular year is 1 in 10,000. The typical gun buy-back program yields less than 1,000 guns. Even ignoring the first two points made above (the guns turned in are unlikely to be used by criminals and may be replaced by purchases of new guns), one would expect a reduction of less than one-tenth of one homicide per year in response to such a gun buy-back program. The program might be cost-effective if those were the correct parameters, but the small scale makes it highly unlikely that its effects would be detected.

In light of the weakness in the theory underlying gun buy-backs, it is not surprising that research evaluations of U.S. efforts have consistently failed to document any link between such programs and reductions in gun violence (Callahan et al., 1994; Police Executive Research Forum, 1996; Rosenfeld, 1996).

Outside the United States there have been a small number of buy-backs of much larger quantities of weapons, in response to high-profile mass murders with firearms. Following a killing of 35 persons in Tasmania in 1996 by a lone gunman, the Australian government prohibited certain categories of long guns and provided funds to buy back all such weapons in private hands (Reuter and Mouzos, 2003). A total of 640,000 weapons were handed in to the government (at an average price of approximately $350), constituting about 20 percent of the estimated stock of weapons. The weapons subject to the buy-back, however, accounted for a modest share of all homicides or violent crimes more generally prior to the buyback. Unsurprisingly, Reuter and Mouzos (2003) were unable to find evidence of a substantial decline in rates for these crimes. They noted that in the six years following the buy-back, there were no mass murders with firearms and fewer mass murders than in the previous period; these are both weak tests given the small numbers of such incidents annually.

Banning Assault Weapons

In 1994, Congress enacted the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, which banned the importation and manufacture of certain military-style semiautomatic “assault” weapons and ammunition magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds (National Institute of Justice, 1997). Assault weapons and large-capacity magazines manufactured before the effective date of the ban were grandfathered and thus legal to own and transfer. These guns are believed to be particularly dangerous because they facilitate the rapid firing of high numbers of shots. While assault weapons and large-capacity magazines are used only in a modest fraction of gun crimes, the premise of the ban was that a decrease in their use may reduce gunshot victimization, particularly victimizations involving multiple wounds or multiple victims (Roth and Koper, 1997).

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A recent evaluation of the short-term effects of the 1994 federal assault weapons ban did not reveal any clear impacts on gun violence outcomes (Koper and Roth, 2001b). Using state-level Uniform Crime Reports data on gun homicides, the authors of this study suggest that the potential impact of the law on gun violence was limited by the continuing availability of assault weapons through the ban’s grandfathering provision and the relative rarity with which the banned guns were used in crime before the ban. Indeed, as the authors concede and other critics suggest (e.g., Kleck, 2001), given the nature of the intervention, the maximum potential effect of the ban on gun violence outcomes would be very small and, if there were any observable effects, very difficult to disentangle from chance yearly variation and other state and local gun violence initiatives that took place simultaneously. In a subsequent paper on the effects of the assault weapons ban on gun markets, Koper and Roth (2001a) found that, in the short term, the prices of assault weapons in both primary and legal secondary markets rose substantially at the time of the ban, and this may have reduced the availability of the assault weapons to criminals. However, this increase in price was short-lived as a surge in assault weapon production in the months prior to the ban and the availability of legal substitutes caused prices to fall back to nearly preban levels. The ban is also weakened by the ease with which legally available guns and magazines can be altered to evade the intent of the ban. The results of these two studies should be interpreted with caution, since any trends observed in the relatively short study time period (24-month followup period) are unlikely to predict long-term trends accurately.

District of Columbia Handgun Ban

Bans on the ownership, possession, or purchase of guns are the most direct means available to policy makers for reducing the prevalence of guns. The District of Columbia’s Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975 is the most carefully analyzed example of a handgun ban. This law prohibited the purchase, sale, transfer, and possession of handguns by D.C. residents other than law enforcement officers or members of the military. Note, however, that individuals who had previously registered handguns prior to the passage of this law were allowed to keep them under this law. Long guns were not covered by the ban.6

One would expect the passage of the District’s handgun ban to have little impact on the existing stock of legally held handguns but to greatly reduce the flow of new handguns to law-abiding citizens. Over time, the number of legally held handguns will decline. It is less clear how the illegal

6For a more detailed discussion of the law and the politics surrounding its passage, see Jones (1981).