CDC Links Poverty to 2020’s Elevated Firearm Homicide Rate

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a study this week which showed a higher firearm homicide rate in 2020 relative to 2019, and pointed to poverty as a factor in the increase.

The CDC study showed that “the firearm homicide rate in 2020 was the highest recorded since 1994.” But it also showed that the increase in the firearm homicide rates varied across demographics.

For example, among males the “largest increases in firearm homicide rates were among Black males aged 10–24 (from 54.9 per 100,000 people in 2019 to 77.3 in 2020) and 25–44 years (66.5 to 90.6).”