Permissive concealed carry laws = a lower rate of homicide involving firearms.

As Instapundit writes, "the science is settled." Economist Mark Gius published the result of his new study in the journal Applied Economics Letters. The study shows,

that permissive concealed carry laws (generally, “shall issue”) result in a lower rate of homicide involving firearms. Conversely, state-level assault weapons bans have no statistically significant effect on the homicide rate involving guns.

The purpose of the present study is to determine the effects of state-level assault weapons bans and concealed weapons laws on state-level murder rates. Using data for the period 1980 to 2009 and controlling for state and year fixed effects, the results of the present study suggest that states with restrictions on the carrying of concealed weapons had higher gun-related murder rates than other states. It was also found that assault weapons bans did not significantly affect murder rates at the state level. These results suggest that restrictive concealed weapons laws may cause an increase in gun-related murders at the state level.

Read more here.