(EUGENE GARCIA/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)In the wake of terrible events like Sunday night’s mass shooting in Las Vegas, people often wonder whether the United States is a particularly violent society. As an officially recorded cause of death, “assault” does not pick out the exact mechanism of death, such as a gunshot vs. a stabbing, and so on. The United States is not the most violent country in the world, or even the most violent in the OECD by this measure. Even as overall rates of violent death decline, the horrific, high-visibility mass shooting appears to have become more common in the United States in recent years. For as long as powerful firearms remain easily available to private citizens, the United States is likely to remain well above the OECD average when it comes to violent death.

Source: Washington Post October 03, 2017 11:03 UTC