During his town hall discussion Thursday night, President Obama opined that “while we cannot guarantee that criminals are not going to have ways of getting guns,” the government can use “the laws of supply and demand” to make guns “a little more expensive to get” so that “fewer people get them.”
Obama’s proposal to make guns a “little more expensive to get” will make people who are most susceptible to gun violence--those who live in poverty--unable to defend themselves. This impacts minority populations, particularly blacks.
The relationship between poverty and gun-related deaths has often been discussed. Even the Huffington Post and the Socialist Worker have named poverty as the “trigger” for gun deaths.
Data has also shown a relationship between gun deaths and poverty. A 24/7 Wall St. analysis of 2013 gun death numbers provided by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention discovered “The poverty rate in eight of the 10 states with the most gun violence was above the national rate of 15.8%.” As well, according to a 2011 analysis by the Atlantic’s CityLab, there is a correlation between gun deaths and poverty at the state level.
Many of those who live in poverty happen to be minorities.
The United States Census Bureau shows the poverty rate for blacks is more than twice the poverty rate for whites (25.8 percent compared to 11.6 percent). The poverty rate is highest among American Indians and Alaskan Natives, at 27.0 percent. For Hispanics, the poverty rate ranges from 16.2 percent for Cubans to 26.3 percent for Dominicans.
Considering blacks are already twice as likely to be killed by guns than whites but only 19 percent of blacks claim to own a gun (compared to 41 percent of whites), Obama’s proposal to make guns “a little more expensive” would make it harder for many blacks in high-risk areas to obtain guns to defend themselves.