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We analyze the timing and pattern of adoption of "shall issue" concealed-carry handgun laws. "Shall issue" laws require the authorities to issue permits to qualified applicants; "may issue" laws give the authorities more latitude to reject applications. We find three factors influence the shift from "may issue" to "shall issue." First, more urban states are less likely to shift to "shall issue," although the size of this effect is quantitatively small. Second, the switch is influenced by the decisions taken by neighboring states. Third, we find evidence that increases in the crime rate accelerated the switch to "shall issue."
(JEL K40)
ABBREVIATIONS
NRA: National Rifle Association
UCR: Uniform Crime Report
I. INTRODUCTION
Gun control has long been a contentious issue for policy makers. Increasingly, academics have weighed in on the consequences of various types of gun control laws. The growth of more extensive data sets and the development of sophisticated econometric tools with which to analyze them has led to an explosion in the growth of the academic literature on gun control. In important-and controversial-work, Bronars and Lott (1998), Lott and Mustard (1997), and Lott (1998, 2000, 2003) analyzed an unprecedented volume of statistical data on gun control and crime statistics. They found that more liberal gun control laws (i.e., those that make it easier for law-abiding citizens to obtain firearms) led to a reduction in the incidence of violent crime. Black and Nagin (1998), Ludwig (1998), and Ayres and Donahue (2003), among others, have critiqued both the methodology and the conclusions of Lott et al.'s findings; Hartley and Cohen (1998), Heiland and Tabarrok (2004), Plassmann and Whitely (2003), among others, support Lott et al.'s results.
The goal of this paper is not to reassess the debate over the consequences of various gun control regimes, but instead to explain the timing and pattern of the adoption of different gun control laws across U.S. states during the past 40 yr. There are a wide variety of such laws. These include restrictions on categories of people who are allowed to buy firearms (e.g., felons, misdemeanor offenders, juvenile offenders, aliens, minors, those subject to a restraining order, the mentally ill), limitations on types of firearms allowed (e.g., handguns, assault weapons, machine guns), and regulations on sales...