David D. Friedman Quote

"Suppose one little old lady in ten carries a gun. Suppose that one in ten of those, if attacked by a mugger, succeeds in killing the mugger instead of being killed by him -- or shooting herself in the foot. On average, the mugger is much more likely to win the encounter than the little old lady. But -- also on average -- every hundred muggings produces one dead mugger. At those odds, mugging is an unprofitable business -- not many little old ladies carry enough money to justify one chance in a hundred of being killed getting it. The number of muggers declines drastically, not because they have all been killed but because they have, rationally, sought safer professions."

By:	David D. Friedman (more quotes by David D. Friedman or books by/about David D. Friedman)
	(1945- ) American economist, physicist, legal scholar, and libertarian theorist
Source:	Hidden Order: The Economics of Everyday Life (New York: Harper, 1996), p. 299
Categories:	Arms, Crime, Guns, Security, Death
Rating: