U.S. teens and young adults, ages 15-24, are 50 times more likely to die by gun violence than they are in other economically advanced countries, according to the 50-state breakdown.
In 2017 — the year of a mass shooting in Las Vegas that killed 58 and injured hundreds — nearly 40,000 people died from gun-related injuries, including 2,500 school children, the report said, noting that six in 10 gun deaths in the U.S. are suicides. [...]
Rural states, meanwhile, have the highest rates of gun deaths and bear the largest costs as a share of their economies. Nationally, the cost of gun violence in the U.S. runs $229 billion a year, or 1.4 percent of the gross domestic product, the report said. [...]
The report noted, however, that the economic toll of gun violence is difficult to measure because of a decades-old federal prohibition on funding for research into the problem. Since 1996, Congress has added a little-known amendment to spending legislation that prohibits the use federal funds to advocate or promote gun control. While lawmakers clarified the provision in aspending package last year, stating that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can conduct research on the causes of gun violence, no money was allocated for such research. [...]
It also found economically deprived areas outside of rural America are also hit hard. About 7,500 African Americans die from gun violence every year, the report said — making it 20 times more likely that a young black male will die by a firearm homicide than a white peer.
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