Guns, Coronavirus, and Political Partisanship

Gun demand in the United States surged during COVID-19 pandemic. Combining multiple data sets including phone location, federal firearm licenses, Google trends, and county-level votes, this study investigates the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Americans’ gun demand, which is approximated by gun shop visits. This paper shows that the increase in gun shop visits is highly correlated with the evolution of the pandemic. It highlights that people with different partisan inclinations behaved differently in gun purchases. Counties with a higher Republican vote share have witnessed greater increases in gun shop visits relative to those with a lower Republican vote share. This paper also identifies less coronavirus risk avoidance for Republicans as the mechanism of increase in gun demand. Our findings suggest that policy interventions such as targeting more tailored preventive messages towards specific populations can work as a nudge