I used to believe that Kleck’s estimate of DGU’s was correct, but overwhelming evidence to the contrary has convinced me otherwise.
Sam A. Kersh writes:
To the best of my knowledge, you have never accepted Kleck’s DGU estimates. At least not in the last 5 years that you and I (and Pim) have debated guns, crime and ‘Point Blank.’
Here’s what I wrote about it back in 1991:
A most interesting paper! Like any good scientific paper it raises a lot of questions. The estimate of 1M defensive uses arises from about 50 (4% of 1228) yes respondants. Don’t you just want to have a follow-up survey to find out the circumstances of those 50 defensive uses? Alas, the original data no longer exists. I hope someone funds a larger better survey along similar lines.