Big Iron in the Lone Star State: Does Fear of Crime or Fear of Change Explain Concealed Carry Applications?

• In Event: Getting a Gun: Investigating Gun Acquisition and Concealed Carry Permits

Abstract

Previous research on firearm carrying has focused on the positive association between risks of criminal victimization and the carrying of firearms for self-protection. However, despite years of falling crime rates, applications for concealed carry handguns licenses (CCLs) continued to increase, reaching unprecedented levels during the presidency of Barack Obama. Drawing on recent work emphasizing the importance of political values held by firearm owners, we hypothesize that recent trends in CCL applications are more likely due to threats to the status of gun owners than criminal threats. Drawing on Black's (2011) theory of moral time, we argue that the presidential election of Barack Obama was a substantial movement of social time that threatened gun owners and, consequently, produced a reciprocal movement of social time: a surge in concealed carry applications. To test our argument, we conduct fixed effects regression analyses using CCL applications in 254 Texas counties from 1996 to 2016. Our findings indicate that, net of controls for other likely influences on CCL rates, CCL application rates in Texas counties do change as expected. These findings add to a growing literature emphasizing the importance of status anxieties and political values in understanding firearm carrying over factors such as criminal threat.

Authors

• Trent Steidley, University of Denver

• Scott Phillips, University of Denver

• Danielle Trujillo, University of Denver