For minors under the age of 18, deaths from vehicles continue to outnumber those caused by firearms, according to recent data compiled by John R. Lott of the Crime Prevention Research Center. The analysis draws on FBI murder statistics and other sources to compare causes of death among children and teenagers.
Vehicle-related fatalities have consistently exceeded firearm deaths in most years analyzed. For the years 2019, 2020, 2022, and 2023, available FBI data shows that more minors died in vehicle incidents than from firearms. Data for 2021 is incomplete but is expected to follow a similar pattern.
A significant portion of firearm deaths among minors involves older teenagers. “About 72% of the firearm murders for those under 18 involve 15-, 16-, and 17-year-olds. So that would be 40% of all the firearm deaths. About 57% of those involve 16- and 17-year-olds. That is 32% of all firearm deaths,” Lott stated. He added that these incidents are often connected to gang activity: “These deaths are largely gang-related, and even banning guns is unlikely to stop drug gangs from getting a hold of guns to protect their extremely valuable drugs.”
The report also notes that suffocation was a leading cause of death for minors in some years studied, with numbers close to or exceeding total firearm fatalities between 2019 and 2023.
Lott argues that suicide statistics involving firearms should be interpreted carefully when considering policy changes related to gun ownership. “Suicides should also be excluded because the common claim is that if guns are eliminated, people either won’t try to commit suicide or cannot do it successfully. Yet in places where guns are banned, total suicide rates remain unchanged — people change how they commit suicide.” According to his analysis, excluding suicides reduces reported firearm death numbers significantly; using CDC data from recent years, removing suicides lowers totals by up to nearly forty percent.
Accidental gun deaths among children remain relatively rare compared with other causes; an average of ninety-two accidental gun fatalities per year occurred among those under eighteen between 2011 and 2020. Among children under ten killed accidentally by firearms during this period, two-thirds were shot by adult males with violent criminal histories or substance abuse issues.
“Presumably, since these individuals are illegally owning guns, it is unlikely that even banning guns would have a significant impact on the rate of those accidental gun shots,” Lott said.
In summary, vehicle-related deaths for minors aged under eighteen were found to be between fourteen percent and thirty-five percent higher than combined murders, suicides, and accidents involving firearms from 2020 through 2023.
“Even when you use homicides instead of murders, which includes justifiable homicides, vehicle deaths are six percent greater in 2021 and there is a less than one percent difference in 2022 and 2023,” Lott concluded.
This article was republished with permission from Crime Prevention Research Center.
