WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Gun ownership among U.S. adults is holding steady near 30%, but that masks a sharp increase in ownership among Republican women offsetting declines among Democratic and independent men. Meanwhile, ownership remains high among Republican men but is relatively scarce among Democratic and independent women.
According to six-year groupings of Â鶹´«Ã½AV’s annual measurement of personal gun ownership since 2007, the percentage of Republican women who own a gun has increased from 19% in 2007-2012 to 33% in 2019-2024. Meanwhile, the rate has fallen seven percentage points among Democratic men, to 29%, and is down five points among independent men, to 39%. Republican men remain the most likely gun owners among gender and party identification subgroups, at 60%.
Combining the 2007-2024 data into three equal time periods allows for in-depth analysis of ownership by key subgroups and changes over time among those subgroups. Â鶹´«Ã½AV previously reported on the first of the three six-year periods in 2013.
As then, gun ownership rates continue to diverge sharply by gender, even as more women personally own a gun. Men (43%) are more than twice as likely as women (20%) to own a gun. However, the gender gap has shrunk from 30 points in 2007-2012 to 23 points in 2019-2024.
While the gender gap has shrunk, the political party gap has expanded. In 2007-2012, personal gun ownership rates differed by 16 points among Republicans (38%) and Democrats (22%). Now the gap is 28 points (47% and 19%, respectively).
Gender Still Top Predictor of Gun Ownership, but Weaker Than in Past
A statistical model that analyzes the effects of a range of demographic and political characteristics simultaneously indicates that gender is the strongest predictor of gun ownership. However, the influence of gender is weaker today than it was in the past.
The model estimates that the statistical odds of a man owning a gun are 3.1 times greater than the odds of a woman owning a gun, after taking into account the effect of other variables. That compares with a much larger 4.5 “odds ratio” for men versus women when applying the same model to the 2007-2012 data.
Republicans are currently 1.5 times more likely than non-Republicans to own a gun, after controlling for the effects of other factors such as gender, region or place of residence. Additionally, Democrats are 1.3 times less likely than non-Democrats to own a gun. This represents a change, as the 2007-2012 analysis did not find that party identification had a meaningful statistical relationship with gun ownership.
The model identifies several other factors that are important predictors of gun ownership, including: household income (2.2 times more likely for upper- than lower-income), living in a rural area (2.1 times more likely than non-rural residents), living in the East (2.0 times less likely than non-Eastern residents), being politically conservative (1.8 times more likely), being politically liberal (1.7 times less likely), living in the South (1.6 times more likely), and being older (1.6 times more likely).
Race, marital status and education had been among the strongest predictors of gun ownership in the 2007-2012 data, but those factors are less influential today as political party, ideology and income have grown in importance.
Gun Ownership Rates High Among Rural Residents
The 2019-2024 data show a wide gap in gun ownership rates between self-identified rural (51%) and big city residents (20%). Rural residents are the lone major subgroup among whom a majority say they personally own a gun. Americans living in small cities, towns or suburbs generally have gun ownership rates near the national average.
Southern residents (40%) are twice as likely as Eastern residents (19%) to own a gun, while those in the Midwest and West have average levels of gun ownership.
Political conservatives also rank among the major subgroups with the highest gun ownership rates, at 45%, far more than the 16% among political liberals.
Major age and income differences largely owe to lower gun ownership rates among young adults (20%) and lower-income Americans (23%).
Combinations of some of the biggest predictors of gun ownership yield even higher rates of ownership than seen among the major subgroups. For example, some of the highest ownership rates are found among:
- men living in rural areas (67%)
- rural Republicans (62%)
- conservatives living in rural areas (62%)
- rural Southerners (59%)
In contrast, some of the lowest gun ownership rates can be found among:
- women aged 18 to 29 (9%)
- Democrats (9%) and liberals (10%) aged 18 to 29
- residents of big cities in the East (10%)
- women living in the East (10%)
- Eastern residents aged 18 to 29 (10%)
Bottom Line
A steady 31% of U.S. adults personally own a gun, while another 13% say there is a gun in their household that belongs to someone else. The stability in the overall figures obscures an increase in ownership among women in general, driven by Republican women. At the same time, fewer Democratic and independent men own guns, suggesting that gun ownership decisions may be influenced by one’s political beliefs more than in the past, likely because of the salience of the gun issue in political campaigns and political culture today.
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