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Expansion of SNAP eligibility and rates of firearm deaths

Introduction

Poverty is a consistent correlate of firearm-involved mortality, yet little work has considered the effects of social and economic policies on these deaths. This study examined associations of state elimination of the asset test and increases in the income limit for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) eligibility with rates of firearm-involved suicide and homicide deaths in the United States.

Methods

This ecological repeated cross-sectional study used 2015–2019 data from the SNAP Policy Database and death certificate data from the National Vital Statistics System. The exposures were (1) state elimination of the asset test for SNAP eligibility and (2) state elimination of the asset test and increases in the income limit for SNAP eligibility, compared with (3) state adoption of neither policy. The outcomes were firearm-involved suicide deaths and firearm-involved homicide deaths. The research team conducted mixed-effects regressions to estimate associations.

Results

State elimination of the asset test for SNAP eligibility (incidence rate ratio (IRR), 0.67; 95% CI, 0.48 to 0.91) and state adoption of both eliminating the asset test and increasing the income limit for SNAP eligibility (IRR, 0.68; 95% CI, 0.49 to 0.92) were associated with decreased rates of firearm-involved suicide deaths compared with state adoption of neither policy. There were no associations with state firearm-involved homicide rates.

Conclusions

SNAP is an important social safety net programme that addresses food insecurity, and the present results suggest it may also contribute to reducing firearm-involved suicide.

Advances in data linkage and science for IP research

The recent COVID-19 pandemic stimulated unprecedented linkage of datasets worldwide, and while injury is endemic rather than pandemic, there is much to be learned by the injury prevention community from the data science approaches taken to respond to the pandemic to support research into the primary, secondary and tertiary prevention of injuries. The use of routinely collected data to produce real-world evidence, as an alternative to clinical trials, has been gaining in popularity as the availability and quality of digital health platforms grow and the linkage landscape, and the analytics required to make best use of linked and unstructured data, is rapidly evolving. Capitalising on existing data sources, innovative linkage and advanced analytic approaches provides the opportunity to undertake novel injury prevention research and generate new knowledge, while avoiding data waste and additional burden to participants. We provide a tangible, but not exhaustive, list of examples showing the breadth and value of data linkage, along with the emerging capabilities of natural language processing techniques to enhance injury research. To optimise data science approaches to injury prevention, injury researchers in this area need to share methods, code, models and tools to improve consistence and efficiencies in this field. Increased collaboration between injury prevention researchers and data scientists working on population data linkage systems has much to offer this field of research.

Underground Gun Markets

This article provides an economic analysis of underground gun markets, drawing on interviews with gang members, gun dealers, professional thieves, prostitutes, police, public school security guards and teenagers in the city of Chicago, complemented by results from government surveys of recent arrestees in 22 cities, plus administrative data for suicides, homicides, robberies, arrests and confiscated crime guns. We find evidence that transactions costs are considerable in the underground gun market in Chicago, and to some extent in other cities as well. The most likely explanation is that the underground gun market is both illegal and ‘thin’– relevant information about trading opportunities is scarce due to illegality, which makes search costly for market participants and leads to a market thickness effect on transaction costs.

New US Surgeon General Advisory on Gun Violence

Deaths from firearms have soared in the US over the past few decades. Now, guns are the leading cause of death of children. In addition, the majority of adults report they’ve experienced gun violence, including being threatened by a firearm or witnessing someone getting shot.

Overview of The American School Shooting Study

Although rare events, school shootings remain a pressing public policy issue in America. Importantly, available data show a modest upward trend in multiple-casualty school shootings. Few crimes are as shocking as the recent mass shooting attack at the Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, on May 24, 2022, in which 19 students and two teachers were murdered. These high-profile events have led to heated debates about gun control, gun rights, mental health, and privacy rights.

Surveys suggest that Americans today tend to view schools as unsafe, and public fear over school violence has deepened. Indeed, the adverse costs of school shootings go well-beyond the terrible loss of life and grief of the families and communities immediately impacted. The effects reverberate throughout the nation. Not only are teachers and schoolchildren directly exposed, but parents, police, first responders, nurses, surgeons, pastors, counselors, and custodians, to name a few, are also vicariously affected. In the wake of traumatic attacks, schools struggle to cope, and surviving students’ school performance may suffer.

Although research on school shootings has increased recently, much of the literature is inconsistent, primarily due to variations in datasets and school shooting definitions. Most studies employ small nonprobability rather than randomly selected samples of US school shooters or prioritize mass shootings and lethal gun violence. By contrast, the limited quantitative studies tend to be more inclusive by studying fatal and nonfatal gun assaults. Even here, there are disparities in inclusion criteria, as some studies examine school-associated violence that transpires both on and off campus property.

While extensive data have documented school crimes more broadly, there is far less information on school shootings. For instance, the Department of Justice’s National Crime Victimization Survey’s (NCVS) School Crime Supplement provides homicide numbers but exclude precise statistics on school shootings. This lack of consistent, national-level data has hindered the development of systematic research, limiting our capacity to create and implement public policy that is directed toward reducing school shootings and is rooted in rigorous social science. Accordingly, we created a national-level database using open-source information to examine school shootings in the United States and provide stakeholders with the information they need to develop meaningful policies.

Can Mass Shootings be Stopped?

Over the last two years, there have been a number of high-profile mass public shootings in the United States that have dominated the headlines and captured the attention of the public and policymakers alike—from Buffalo, New York (May 14, 2022; 10 dead) to Uvalde, Texas (May 24, 2022; 21 dead), Highland Park, Illinois (July 4, 2022; 7 dead), Monterrey Park, California (January 21, 2023; 11 dead), and Louisville, Kentucky (April 10, 2023; 5 dead). Although mass public shootings rarely made headlines during the height of the pandemic, the frequency of events has since rebounded to pre-COVID levels. Consequently, these and other mass public shootings have reinforced the need to do more to prevent these tragedies from occurring and to mitigate the harms to individuals and communities if and when they happen. To achieve these goals, it is important to understand the trends associated with the phenomenon of mass public shootings.

The Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium (the Consortium) first published a report in 2018 analyzing 51 years (1966–2016) of mass public shootings data. In order to better understand the phenomenon of mass shootings, the report presented information on the location of shootings, weapons used, and demographics of the perpetrators. A follow-up report released in 2021 integrated an additional four years of data (2017–20). These reports were based on a comprehensive database of US mass public shootings from researchers Jaclyn Schildkraut and H. Jaymi Elsass.

As the United States continues to face record rates of gun violence, with mass public shootings also increasing in frequency, the need for evidence-based policies is all the more important. A starting point, however, is understanding the different contexts and characteristics of various forms of firearm violence. Mass public shootings, although among the rarest forms of gun violence, require different strategies for prevention and response from other incidents. These shootings often involve considerable planning, which can provide important opportunities for identification, intervention, and de-escalation of the threat before it is carried out, unlike other forms of more spontaneous gun violence. Additionally, mass public shootings often are random in nature and occur in large, open public spaces, which present different challenges—including preventative security measures and law enforcement responses—from targeted incidents and those that occur in private locations.

Taken together, understanding the unique context of the mass public shootings phenomenon is necessary for policymakers, practitioners, and other vested stakeholders to work to reduce these incidents and their impacts. This updated report includes two additional years of data and identifies changes in trends related to mass shootings, particularly as Americans resumed activities like work and school outside of the home amid the rollout of the COVID vaccine. Specifically, this brief presents analyses of a total of 57 years of mass shootings data (1966–2022). The analyses include the frequency of events, fatalities and injuries, distribution of location types, patterns of weapon usage, and perpetrators’ demographic characteristics. The appendix reports the findings for only the two most recent years of data and compares them to the patterns for the previous 55 years.

The New Hood Peace Partners: Podcast

The New Hood Peace Partners is a podcast about community-based violence prevention, the people who do it, the practice of how it’s done, and the policy around it. This show is a production of The New Hood, a community-based think tank dedicated to empowering Black and Brown communities through policy ideas, research, and solutions.