FOX and Bret Baier think Norway has a higher death rate from mass shootings than the US. Are they fucking high?
In the wake of this recent shooting, a stats table from an episode of Bret Baier's Special Report has been circulating around the web. This table comes from an episode back in December 2015, only a few days after the San Bernadino shooting in California.
What was inaccurately represented in that episode is that all these countries must have relatively more deaths from mass shootings because the U.S. has a lower rate. Notice the little caveat underneath the title? "Per million people". In 2015, The United States had a population of 321 million. Norway had about 5.2 million. If you turn those numbers into a ratio and simplify it, you get roughly about 1 Norwegian per 61.7 Americans. Multiply that by .095, and if Norway had a death rate from mass shootings like the U.S.A did, about 6 people per year would die from mass shootings Norway. From these stats that Mr. Baier so deceitfully presented to us, the U.S.A. has about 3x more deaths from annual mass shootings than Norway.
The gun control debate will always be a volatile and confusing argument with the media spreading around disinformation. Reporters can't be held accountable in this day and age, so always do your research before taking bullshit to heart.
That's how "rates" work.
In a population of 100 the effects of 1 person doing something are far more statistically significant than 1 person doing something in a population of 1,000. A "rate" of 1 vs .1 of X event for every 100 people.
This also means that significant one-time events have more of an impact on rates in a small population than they do a larger one. Such as the mass shooting at the camp in Norway.
The rates are higher. The numbers are not. From my first example, let's say 2 out of 100 do X while 15 out of 1,000 do X. That rate would be 2 and 1.5, respectively, per 100. Higher rate for the first population but 7.5 times the number in the second population.
Rates aren't the absolute best metric, especially when extreme outlier events are included, but there's nothing factually incorrect about that graphic, as far as I know.
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