Aversion to Risk

It's all a function of aversion to risk. All animals have a built in aversion to risk that over time gets honed and refined by their environment. If you learn that you can run a read light 99 times out of a hundred and not get caught, you will run them more often.

Aversion to risk can, in almost every situation, be harnessed with the implementation of a high probability of death. If everybody carried a gun, there would be fewer muggings. Not zero, because tactics would change to the situation. You'd likely have a sniper just execute the intended victim, then a partner plunder the corpse. No set of rules will get rid of crime, but the right set of rules can certainly reduce the number of crimes. There will always be crime. As long as guns exist there will always be gun crime. And as long as the weak want to protect themselves against the malevolent strong, there will always be a need for guns. They are the great equalizers. Unfortunately, the offense will always be a step ahead of defense, even if we arm everybody. It's still a better path than arming the criminals and disarming the citizens.