[TKDietz]

I don’t think the sky will fall. Overall I think we’ll be better off. Maybe you are right and I am wrong, but I think we’ll see something similar to what we see with the beer industry. The marijuana industry won’t ever be as big as the beer industry, but then again I bet the beer industry costs us an awful lot more money in societal problems like accidents, violent crime etc., than the marijuana industry will ever cost us, whether it’s legal or not.

Here’s an article I just read on the beer industry: New Study Shows Beer Industry Contributes Billions Annually to U.S. Economy
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=109&STORY=/www/story/04-23-2007/0004571414&EDATE=

Again, my bet is that marijuana is legal in most states if not all by the time the last Baby Boomer hits retirement age, 65. That will happen by 2030. As we approach that time our government will be increasingly strapped for cash and will be desperately seeking ways to generate revenue to care for the swelling senior citizen population. Older folks in power in the three branches of government who run this country, as well as the older voters who outvote young people by wide margins, will slowly but surely be replaced by younger people far less afraid of marijuana. The whole debate will change, and I bet that some time between 2015 and 2030 we’ll see marijuana regulated and taxed similar to the way alcohol is now. That will scare a lot of people, but in the end I think most will look back and wonder why we didn’t do it a long time ago.

[elfman2]

Marijuana grows like a weed, requiring no great skill to perfect like distilled spirits or beer. It’s too powerful to smoke in large quantities, appreciating subtle variations all day like cigarettes. How are we going to generate tax revenue from something that a near idiot can grow a year’s supply of in a small follower pot?