Citation

Lott JR. J. Legal Stud. (Chicago) 1998; 27(1): 221-243.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1998, University of Chicago Press)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Dan A. Black and Daniel S. Nagin state that my article with David Mustard assumes that the effect of concealed-handgun laws is constant over time, that the effect is the same across states, that the article does not control for local time trends, and that we did not investigate whether the results were sensitive to the missing values of the arrest rate. None of these claims are correct, and this is easily verified by anyone who reads the original article. Their statement that the results are sensitive to including Florida applies to fewer than 1 percent of the regressions that I have reported. Using results from previous drafts of Black and Nagin's comment as well as new estimates of my own, I provide additional evidence that allowing law-abiding citizens to carry concealed handguns deters criminals. Violent crime rates were rising before the law was passed and fell thereafter.