Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America's Heartland

by Jonathan M. Metzl

At the same time, research suggested that gun injuries and deaths rose after it became easier for people to buy and carry firearms. For instance, a team of investigators led by Daniel Webster, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, analyzed crime data from Missouri and found that the state’s 2007 repeal of its permit-to-purchase (PTP) handgun law “was associated with a 25 percent increase in firearm homicides rates.” Between 2008 and 2014, the Missouri gun homicide rate rose to 47 percent higher than the national average. Rates of gun death by suicide, partner violence, and accidental shooting soared as well. In 2014, gun deaths topped deaths by motor vehicle accident for the first time in the state. News outlets referred to Missouri as the “Shoot Me State.”