Voidwar

Stop dodging this challenge.

I submit that your "social costs" are a myth and do not in fact exist. Prove me wrong with concrete examples of the "social cost" of Ikari's privately owned weapons.

Goldenboy219

Well chap, your opinion of why we cant use raw data was not response to my question, instead it was an attempt to run away from reality.

So Succa, what are some reasons a city with the strictest gun laws is the national leader in the gun related murder ratio? You know, your opinion on a real live urban situation

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Scucca

We're not talking about a friendly market failure here. We're not talking about an "oops" moment. We're talking about a significant increase in crime. It is quite revealing to me that when supply/demand is not convenient, despite it being based on methodological individualism, you're prepared to simply ignore it. I cannot support a sub-optimal price because I cannot support the negative externalities it generates. This is merely asking for mutually beneficial exchange without market failure.

Collectivism sucks? Sounds awfully high powered! I haven't referred to collectivism. I've referred to orthodox economic analysis based on methodological individualism.

Facing the correct price is not a punishment. It just ensures no free riding.

I don't have any opinion about guns. I do think that there is a selection bias with people with warped preferences (and therefore a danger) having a higher probability of demanding guns. However, that bunch are clearly a very small minority.

I don't like crime. This is certainly true. However, in a country with a gun culture, externalities cannot be used to demand prohibition. I therefore haven't called for it

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Scucca

I haven't dodged anything. I've presented empirical evidence in support of my position, with several published articles that investigate the impact of gun ownership on crime rates. You've replied with some nonsense about correlations. You should have responded with either an attack on the paper's methodologies or some alternative evidence for me to consider. You've achieved neither and that is not good enough.

Voidwar

Still dodging. Still claiming that these "social costs" and "negative externalities" exist when you can't show a concrete example thereof.

Show us the concrete examples I have asked for, or admit that your whole line of reasoning is based on a myth.

Scucca

I've provided several published articles that, via regression analysis, are able to isolate the gun ownership variable and demonstrate whether there are any significant increases in crime. Why haven't you had the good grace to scroll back and review them? That should have been your first step. You then should either attack the papers directly, or provide alternative analysis.

To get you started refer back to page 1 and Cook and Ludwig (2006, The social costs of gun ownership, Journal of Public Economics, Vol 90, pp 379-391) who conclude that "an increase in gun prevalence causes an intensification of criminal violence—a shift toward greater lethality, and hence greater harm to the community". The article uses a panel dataset consisting of 200 of the largest counties from 1980 and 1999. With crime data secured from sources such as the Vital Statistics Program mortality data and the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports, it covers the majority of homicides in the US (e.g. 74% in 1990). The methodology is based on a regression technique that controls for the possibility of reverse causation. The authors take their results further to demonstrate the social costs associated with their estimates: i.e. if these externalities were to be internalised a gun license fee of $1800 per household may be required.

Voidwar

Why are you still dodging ? You still have not shown me concrete proof of the "social cost" of Ikari's privately owned firearms. You still have not shown me concrete examples of "negative externalities" created by Ikari's firearms in particular.

That should have been your first step.

Scucca

You're not understanding externalities! I am not here to educate you, so you really do need to catch up on your own. Clearly, we can't rely on the social knowledge of the gun lobby

We have empirical evidence in support of "more guns=more crime". That ensures that the market result is inefficient, given that is based on marginal private costs and marginal private benefits. We know that there are social costs and therefore we should have the result based on marginal social costs and marginal private benefits. Ikari's relevancy is only in ensuring he faces the correct price, where the market price takes into account the social costs imposed on others via the equilibrium quantity consumed.

Ikari

Free market sets the price. It's paid by anyone wishing to get a gun through legal means. You are looking to punish the people obeying the law for the actions of people not obeying the law. That's not right, not in the least. You can't hold people responsible for actions they didn't take themselves, but this is exactly what you're trying to do. You ignore this point repeatedly, how can you justify punishing people for not breaking the law? It seems pretty crazy to me. I'm not ignoring the consequences of a free society, I accept and shoulder the burdens, consequences, and responsibilities of being free. Being free necessarily means not being safe to a certain degree because you are allowing people to make up their own minds. Some individuals will make the choice to commit crimes, and those are the ones responsible for the crime rate. Me merely exercising my rights does not necessarily mean that I will infringe upon the rights of others. And you can't take legal action against me, punish me, less I have personally infringed upon the rights of others.

You have not used the word, but what you are doing is a form of collectivism. You're looking at the aggregated results of a right and noting that because that right exists there are certain negative consequences to the collective. Then you suggest that we use the government to preemptively punish people through monetary fines for exercising their rights. That's ridiculous, a right is a right; I own it, it's innate to me. I don't get punished if I merely exercise a right, it is a right and I am free to exercise it at my leisure. That's what a right is, and in a free society the rights of the individual are upheld and guaranteed.

It is if you are doing it against individuals whom have committed no crime and are merely exercising one of their innate and inalienable rights.

Your agenda is showing. You are seeking punishment for the exercise of a right because it has negative impacts on the collective. Well no duh! Once again, free has not been, is not now, and never will be safe. There are inherent dangers to being free, and if you're seeking freedom than you must accept and shoulder the consequences of being free. There will be gun crime because guns are allowed, you deal with it on the individual level.

You call for it through backdoor methods of fining people for exercising rights, thus discouraging people from exercising their innate and inalienable rights. In essence assuring that only the rich are allowed full access to their rights. It's pretty sick if you get down to the base of what you're calling for.

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Voidwar

More dodging. If your line of reasoning held water, if private gun ownership created either "social costs" or "negative externalities" then you could show the particular examples thereof created by Ikari's weapons in particular. You cannot show this, because your "social costs" and "negative externalities" are a myth, one that you cannot causally link to Ikari's privately owned firearms.

Show me the concrete examples of these "myths", or admit they do not exist.

Don't bother dodging with another round of mumbojumbo.

Provide concrete examples of the "social cost" or "negative externalities" of Ikari's privately owned firearms, or admit defeat.