RAND Wraps Up Decade of Gun Policy Research with New Online Tool, Updated Data and Reports
For Release
Thursday
January 29, 2026
RAND today released a slate of new gun policy resources as it concludes its decade-long Gun Policy in America initiative, which has provided objective analyses of the effects of firearm laws in the United States. The new resources include an online visualization tool that allows users to explore how state-level firearm mortality rates relate to a range of social and economic factors, and the fifth edition of RAND's flagship Science of Gun Policy report.
Homicide and suicide mortality rates vary widely across states. The new Firearm Mortality and State Characteristics Visualization Tool allows users to examine how these mortality rates differ among states with similar demographic, economic, political and geographic profiles. It highlights which state characteristics are most strongly linked to firearm violence and identifies states with unexpectedly high or low mortality rates relative to their peers. For example, the tool shows that 60% of state variation in suicide rates is associated with rates of household firearm ownership, a stronger predictor than other factors examined, yet some states, such as Alaska and Colorado, have suicide rates considerably higher than other states with similar gun ownership levels.
“This new tool provides a way to explore how firearm deaths relate to the broader social and economic context of each state,” said Andrew Morral, co-director of RAND's Gun Policy in America initiative. “By making these relationships transparent, we hope to support more informed discussions about the factors that could contribute to firearm violence and the policies that might reduce it.”
Alongside the new tool, RAND has published the final scheduled edition of The Science of Gun Policy, the project's flagship report assessing the effects of 18 types of gun policies on outcomes such as suicide, violent crime, mass shootings, defensive gun use and hunting and recreation. This edition incorporates findings from 207 studies—up from just 67 in the first edition—and provides increased confidence that permit-to-purchase laws may reduce total and firearm homicides.
“Over the past decade, our goal has been to clarify what is known, and how confident we are in that knowledge, about the effects of gun policies,” said Rosanna Smart, a senior economist at RAND and co-director of the initiative. “While the evidence base has grown substantially, there remain many areas where rigorous research is still lacking. Our work helps identify those gaps and points the way towards future study.”
Other enhancements include an update to the RAND State Firearm Law Database, a comprehensive dataset cataloging state-level firearm laws through September 2025, and an updated essay on mass shootings in the United States. The essay reviews how differing definitions of the term mass shooting can lead to inconsistent estimates of their frequency and trends, underscoring the importance of clear and precise definitions in public discourse and research.
Launched in 2016, RAND's Gun Policy in America project was designed to bring an objective, evidence-based approach to one of the nation's most divisive policy areas. Over the past decade the project has produced a suite of publicly available tools and analyses to help policymakers, researchers, journalists and the public better understand the effects of gun laws.
“All of these resources have been developed to make the best available evidence on gun policy accessible to everyone,” Morral said. “Our hope is that this foundation will continue to support constructive, fact-based dialogue and guide future research that can help reduce gun injuries and deaths in the United States.”
Support for the RAND Gun Policy in America initiative is provided by Arnold Ventures.
All of the new and updated resources are available at www.rand.org/gun-policy.
