In 1979, drug use was almost triple its lowest point in the 90's. Returning to the 1979 level would be a 200% increase -- and drugs were illegal in 1979!
Imagine the increase if drugs were legal! My 50% is quite conservative.
Drugs were illegal in 1979, but enforcement was absurdly lax.
Tobacco use has declined significantly from then, with only a public health campaign and price increases to push it down.
I don't think anyone is advocating simply abolishing the prohibition on drugs. Folks are advocating changing the way we deal with them to the way we deal with tobacco and alcohol use: as a public health problem.
Increased use is a downside of such a policy, but there are lots of upsides:
1. removal of cash-flow to the 'black economy', including indirectly to terrorist groups,
2. the ability to tax trade in drugs, as we do trade in tobacco and alcohol,
3. legally enforcable quality control, and the consequent elimination or virtual elimination of user deaths due to overdose (mostly due to quality fluctuation) or toxins in the supply (cf. recent cases in the Philadelphia/Camden area), supposedly one of the notable harms of drug abuse, but really a consequence of the product being illegal,
4. savings on incarceration (no, they won't all go into gun-running, or other crimes--the money isn't there) and enforcement, even more than is needed to fund increased treatment and anti-drug public health campaigns,
5. decrease in crime to support habits: even with the posited increase in use, and taxes included in the price, removal of the premium charged for illegal trade would drop the price, making it easier for users to support habits without resort to crime, also use would no longer automatically associate the user with criminal elements, nor already place him or her on the wrong side of the law so that psychological resistance to further law-breaking is lessened,
6. improved access to treatment for addicts who want to quit--rightly or wrongly addicts fear to seek treatment for fear of arrest.
It should be pointed out that before drug prohibition, some notable, quite productive individuals were given to the use of 'recreational' drugs (Arthur Conan Doyle and Hector Berlioz come to mind), so the idea that all the 'new users' will ruin their lives is also false.
In 1979, drug use was almost triple its lowest point in the 90's. Returning to the 1979 level would be a 200% increase -- and drugs were illegal in 1979!
Do you realize how completely stupid what you wrote is? Mocking you: In 19 30 marijuana use was about 1% of what is today. Returning to the 1930 level would be 99% decrease -- and drugs marijuana was legal then. Imagine the decrease if marijuana were legal! Use would easily decrease by 50% -- and that's very conservative
You merely picked a date that had high drug usage and compared it to a date of low drug usage and then stated the increase as a percentage. Absolutely no causation whatsoever. And meaningless correlation which is irrelevant anyhow.
You are un-friggin-believable. Did you actually think you could pass that off as legitimate argument to support continuation of drug prohibition? Yes, you most certainly did. You are truly sick. Please RP, get back on your meds.
Since you only count the illegal drugs as being "drug use", if we legalize them there won't be any more drug use.