Preferences for Firearms

Abstract

This paper provides a critical input into crafting effective firearms policy: an understanding of consumer demand for guns. We estimate individual-level price sensitivity and substitution patterns across gun types using stated choice experiments. We find that potential firearm buyers are price insensitive overall, but that first-time handgun buyers are the most price sensitive. We also estimate considerable substitution from semi-automatic long guns to handguns, which are associated with more crimes per gun. This finding suggests that firearm restrictions specifically targeting semi-automatic long guns would have minimal impact on gun ownership.

Keywords: Firearms, Demand estimation, Conjoint analysis, Regulation, Hierarchical Bayes

JEL Classification: L50, L51, L67, L68, H23, I18, K23, M31, M38, C11, C83