America's Top Killing Machine

[xchrom]

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http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/01/americas-top-killing-machine/384440/

?ni32uz

For the better part of a century, the machine most likely to kill an American has been the automobile.

Car crashes killed 33,561 people in 2012, the most recent year for which data is available, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Firearms killed 32,251 people in the United States in 2011, the most recent year for which the Centers for Disease Control has data.

But this year gun deaths are expected to surpass car deaths. That's according to a Center for American Progress report, which cites CDC data that shows guns will kill more Americans under 25 than cars in 2015. Already more than a quarter of the teenagers—15 years old and up—who die of injuries in the United States are killed in gun-related incidents, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics.

[Orrex]

1. I would imagine that more people use cars daily than use guns, too.

It's important to weigh the relative per-use rate of fatality of these two killing machines, too.

k/r

[elias49]

2. True. Which is more deadly?

A quick search indicates a roughly equivalent number or cars and guns in the US. Thank goodness most guns stay in lock boxes or under the pillow considering they are much more likely to cause death.

[Orrex]

4. Guns, obviously.

During my daily commute I pass somewhere between 80 and 200 cars that are actually running, in addition to the many dozens that I pass that are parked and left unattended. During all of my morning commutes over my entire employment history, I have never once passed a discharging firearm.

If the number of cars is similar to the number of firearms, and the number of car-deaths is similar to the number of firearm-deaths, but the rate of use of cars is much, much higher than the rate of use of firearms, then firearms are clearly more dangerous.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

3. I was going to say alcohol.

How many of both types of incidents were precipitated by the use of alcohol. Add in non-auto accidents, domestic violence, child abuse, sexual assault, suicide by means other than gun, disease, etc.

Nothing beats a good, stiff drink.

[Duckhunter935]

5. I think alcohol also

I think this really does not meet the GD SOP but some I guess it needs to be tested again to see if they can get gun posts in.

[bemildred]

6. +1. nt