Defending the Gun Market | Sojourners

Defending the Gun Market

Mary Sanchez, op-ed writer for the Kansas City Star, offers in her column something many of us probably didn’t know:

“There’s a little-known fact about guns in America, and it’s one that the firearms industry and its political allies don’t like to dwell on: The rate of gun ownership in America is declining.

“This has been the case for decades. Rates peaked way back in the 1970s, the era of disco balls and bell bottoms. In 1977, 54 percent of American households reported owning guns. In 2010, the last time the General Social Survey data was compiled, the percentage had shrunk to 32.”

Sanchez concludes that the strong opposition to anti-gun violence measures is driven more by the need of gun manufacturers to sustain their market than it is about the Second Amendment.