Gun owners in the U.S. have long favored more permissive gun policies while adults who do not own guns have tended to favor more restrictive policies. This pattern continues today. For example, 37% of gun owners favor banning assault-style weapons, compared with 74% of non-gun owners – and this gap has grown in recent years, according to a new analysis of surveys conducted in April and June 2021.
Yet these differences in opinion between gun owners and non-owners do not apply to all gun policies. Gun owners are roughly as likely as non-owners to support preventing people with mental illnesses from obtaining guns. And sizable majorities of adults who own guns and those who do not both favor background checks for private gun sales and sales at gun shows.
