TY  - JOUR
AU  - Cook,Philip J.
AU  - Ludwig,Jens
AU  - Venkatesh,Sudhir
AU  - Braga,Anthony A.
TI  - Underground Gun Markets
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 11737
PY  - 2005
Y2  - November 2005
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w11737
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w11737.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Philip J. Cook
Sanford School of Public Policy
Duke University
215 Sanford Building
Durham, NC 27708-0245
Tel: 919 613 7360
Fax:  919/681-8288
E-Mail: pcook@duke.edu

Jens Ludwig
University of Chicago
1155 East 60th Street
Chicago, IL 60637
Tel: 773/834-0811
Fax: 773/834-1582
E-Mail: jludwig@uchicago.edu

Sudhir Venkatesh
Columbia University
E-Mail: sv185@columbia.edu

Anthony Braga
Harvard University
E-Mail: anthony_braga@ksg.harvard.edu
AB  - This paper provides an economic analysis of underground gun markets drawing on interviews with gang members, gun dealers, professional thieves, prostitutes, police, public school security guards and teens in the city of Chicago, complemented by results from government surveys of recent arrestees in 22 cities plus administrative data for suicides, homicides, robberies, arrests and confiscated crime guns. We find evidence of considerable frictions in the underground market for guns in Chicago. We argue that these frictions are due primarily to the fact that the underground gun market is both illegal and %u201Cthin%u201D  -- the number of buyers, sellers and total transactions is small and relevant information is scarce. Gangs can help overcome these market frictions, but the gang%u2019s economic interests cause gang leaders to limit supply primarily to gang members, and even then transactions are usually loans or rentals with strings attached.
ER  -