Gun deaths will soon surpass vehicle deaths for young people according to the Center for American Progress.
In 2010, 6,201 young people between the ages of 15 and 24 died by gunfire. Guns were a close second to the leading cause of death among this age group, car accidents, which took the lives of 7,024 young people that year. But, while car accident deaths among young people have been steadily declining over the past decade, gun deaths have remained relatively unchanged.
Unlike the gun industry, the automobile industry has gone out of its way to improve safety. In fact, safety is often a key selling point that auto dealers can advertise.
Cars that park themselves, cars that automatically break during an emergency, cars that warn you if you veer into another lane, and cars that have rear backup cameras. Not all of these features come standard, but in the near future some of them will. In the near future, some cars will even drive themselves.
The gun industry doesn’t take safety seriously and, on top of that, conservative legislatures across the country are taking steps to remove meager safety requirements such as carry permits.
The insufferable “what about cars? they kill more people than guns” argument will soon be false in addition to being mute.