chance of using your ccw for defense?

The lower, the better ....

much, much higher than you think. I've had a few jobs that hired felons, and a lot of them were long term criminals. They had a good idea who was armed by the subtle body language. They were very good at telling. Police are pretty good at seeing an outline, as are gunshop employees. The moral being, many people who have a reason to know who is armed, and how comfortable they are at the idea DO know and DO avoid them.

Pretty dang low, but the stakes are very high. So carry on.

Wikipedia shouldn’t be taken as gospel by any means, but here’s some related reading on the carrying estimates. Might give you a starting point.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defensive_gun_use

Go outside on a bright night and pick out which star will fall next.

My chances are zero percent...

...unless that changes.

If that happens, it will be 100 percent.

About the same percentage as dying from Covid 19 if you're young and live alone on a farm.............

I looked into this a while back and can not quote a study, but basically my interpretation of looking at studies was the 50% of everyone in the US, statistically speaking, will be on the receiving end of a violent crime in their lifetime. Could be a little more, could be a little less, and then some people and places are higher risk than others. If you live in a suburb, it might be 5%, if you live in Chicago it might be 95% or 295% …

NRA states there’s over
2 million incidents a year.

Between 760,000 and 2.5 million each year are what’s estimated.

https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/unpublished-cdc-study-confirms-2-million-defensive-handgun-uses-annually/

An unpublished Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) study confirms Florida State University criminologist Gary Kleck’s findings of more than two million defensive handgun uses (DGUs) per year.

Since the early 1990s, Kleck has maintained that there is a minimum of 760,000 DGUs annually. However, that is his low estimate. Kleck and research partner Marc Gertz have contended the actual number is closer to 2.5 million, reported Breitbart.

Click to expand...

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paulhs...-asked-about-defensive-gun-uses/#322befc9299a

My dad is in his 80's and has discharged his weapon twice in his life to stop a hostile or potentially hostile encounter- both two & four-legged. He has had weapon in hand for a few more, but no shots. I am in my 40's and have fired once to stop an attack- four-legged, and have also had a gun in hand for several more occurances, both two and four-legged. In my direct experience, the "rules" about such things as "brandishing" and "warning shots" fall apart in the real life scenarios that occur outside the knowledge envelope of supposed defensive experts.

Browning said:

Between 760,000 and 2.5 million each year are what’s estimated.

https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/unpublished-cdc-study-confirms-2-million-defensive-handgun-uses-annually/



https://www.forbes.com/sites/paulhs...-asked-about-defensive-gun-uses/#322befc9299a

Click to expand...

Wow! Had no idea a full scale war was going on. Obviously my state missed it.

Ernie Bass said:

Wow! Had no idea a full scale war was going on. Obviously my state missed it.

Click to expand...

That’s what they say. I’ve read that statistic since the early 1990’s.

The thing is people miss events if they aren’t involved in them. I’ve worked in emergency medicine since 1997 and I’ve heard people talk about how ‘safe’ their community is. Whenever this happens I just smile and nod, because I immediately think of the shooting we ran on last week two blocks over. Or where we had to take a mentally ill woman for a sexual assault examination just on the other side of the freeway. Or where two methamphetamine addicts got into an argument over a load of copper they just stole from a job site a mile down that same street and one split the others head open to the point his scalp looked like a coon skin cap.

What they’re saying is that ‘they’ feel safe. That ‘they’ haven’t been the victim of a violent crime recently.

Mostly criminals victimize other people involved in that lifestyle. If they’re caught they aren’t sentenced to as harsh a sentence than if they victimized a pillar of the community. Plus those people are readily at hand.

Regular people still get victimized, I see it fairly often. They look shocked that it actually happened to them. It most often involves a gun in some form or fashion.

People often miss this stuff and don’t see it. Out of sight, out of mind I guess.

It’s better to have and not need than need and not have

I've been carrying for 25 years and never needed it, so the chance is near zero - amiright.
I've been driving for longer than that and never needed an airbag or seatbelt, so the chance is near zero ... -
Forget statistics. I don't want to be a victim nor seriously injured in a car crash, so I'll keep carrying everywhere legal and wearing the seatbelt.
There is a 100% chance I'd rather be armed if someone tried to kill me than unarmed.

I'm 54 young years old. I don't frequent bad areas. I am super vigilant of my surroundings. There have been 3 times I felt I was going to potentially need to draw my weapon. There was one time I did pull my gun on a guy that blocked me in and jumped out of his car. Long story short, he was trying to hustle me for some money back in 84 Tucson AZ.

Environment and lifestyle would be key issues.

Perhaps a better (and scarier?) question might be to ask ...

What are the chances that someone lawfully carrying a concealed handgun, as a dedicated defensive weapon, might have the knowledge (of the laws) and good sense and decision-making ability to know when it's appropriate and lawful to present (use) their weapon, without falling afoul of the local laws, using poor judgment, etc?

mjsdwash said:

much, much higher than you think. ... long term criminals...Police ... gunshop employees... many people who have a reason to know who is armed, and how comfortable they are at the idea DO know and DO avoid them.

Click to expand...

Hmmmm. I’ve never thought of that, and - of course - there can’t be any statistics on what DIDN’T happen.