Can Marijuana Help Rescue California's Economy?

Time via Yahoo ^ | 3.13.09 | Alison Stateman

[Melinda]

Could marijuana be the answer to the economic misery facing California? Democratic State Assembly member Tom Ammiano thinks so. Ammiano introduced legislation last month that would legalize pot and allow the state to regulate and tax its sale - a move that could mean billions for the cash-strapped state. Pot is, after all, California's biggest cash crop, responsible for $14 billion in annual sales, dwarfing the state's second largest agricultural commodity - milk and cream - which brings in $7.3 billion annually, according to the most recent USDA statistics. The state's tax collectors estimate the bill would bring in about $1.3 billion in much-needed revenue a year, offsetting some of the billions in service cuts and spending reductions outlined in the recently approved state budget.

[SwankyC]

I think the law has a chilling effect

That's what I thought too, until I met some people that smoke. 2 jobs ago, I was working with a very young crowd - audio equipment. I got to know alot of them and found out these teenage/young 20's clowns were bringing it to work. They'd go down the building's back stairs to smoke a J in the smoking area DURING WORK HOURS. And it wasn't a secluded place either.

Yea, it is being gotten and smoked by anyone that wants it.

[SwankyC]

To say it'll just fall to .5 cents on the dollar completely ignores the demand side of the equation - not to mention that assertion flies in the face of the perfect example, repeal of prohibition. You're wrong.

I'm inclined to believe that those that dont currently use it based SOLELY on the laws just MIGHT be inclined to give it a shot.

I wont call YOU an idiot though.

[dalereed]

I hope they catch you with that crap and put you in prison!

[Melinda]

They are simply not accurate. People need to open their eyes to the truth, not to what a phony or incompetent government tells them. Drugs are dirt cheap on the bottom rung of poverty, as that's where they are grown or made in these countries. The poor and homeless are always strung out. I'm telling you, your vision of what exists out there, or what you are hearing from conferences or pristine Gov’t statistics is far from reality. Why are these people struggling? Because they are ALWAYS under the influence. It is beyond sad, it is devastating to any culture, and for those who want to legalize anything that keeps people who can't help themselves (a number always on the increase) in a stupor is immoral.

[nufsed]

Why isn't it immoral to try to do with government force, what the individual should be responsible for themselves? Why isn't it immoral to confiscate my property (wealth) to try to change the behavior of my neighbor?

It would seem to me this reliance upon government control of personal behavior is also immoral and a violation of the individual's liberty and pursuit of happiness.

[Nate505]

I agree. We cannot live in a society that wants to keep mind altering substances around for its population to keep itself in a stupor. Anyone who believe in keeping anything like that legal is immoral.

Now excuse me while I go to a bar and have about 10 shots of Jack Daniels.

[Ken H]

The Dutch seem to have a better handle on drug use than countries fighting a "real" WOD. Why is Singapore doing so poorly?

Link to post #146 with data and sources showing heroin addiction substantially higher in Singapore, the US and Iran than in the Netherlands

______________________________________

Amsterdam had a murder rate of about 3.6/100,000 in 2007¹. San Jose, one of the safest US cities with a population over 500,000, had a murder rate of 3.5 in 2007². Overall, the murder rate in the US is nearly 4X the Dutch rate.³

¹http://www.expatica.com/nl/articles/news/Record-low-murder-rate-once-again.html
²http://city-data.com
³http:/nationmaster.com

[MAD-AS-HELL]

They won’t because I don’t smoke that crap. I just want it legal and the state out of the businesses of wasting it’s time going after smokers who aren’t hurting anyone, ya drunk!

[Mr. Blonde]

At least you are buying American. :)

[Melinda]

Right, the Dutch just export their drugged-up murderers to Aruba. I wouldn’t ever trust statistics, especially those of a foreign country. Besides, they are expert at manufacturing and marketing dangerous drugs. That alone is a reason to make sure those statistics remain low for all to see.

[Ken H]

Do you have any evidence to back up your unsupported assertions on the statistics? Or do you just believe what you want to believe?

[Melinda]

Judging from your past posts, you seem to have more than a passing interest in legalizing pot. Obsessive maybe.

[TKDietz]

I don't believe that laws against marijuana stop many people from using it. Most people don't smoke pot because they don't want to be losers. They don't want to 40 year old stoners living with their parents. They don't want to be one of the stoners at the party glued to the couch staring at the TV with the sound turned off, the guy who can't chat up the ladies because he forgets what he was talking about mid sentence. The vast majority of the good reasons not to smoke pot would still exists even if it was legal to go down to the store and buy pot. That's why we don't see all the Dutch smoking pot even though they can go to the store and buy it.

In California it really is pretty close to being legal already. It's been decriminalized there for decades. If someone does get caught they get a ticket. They've had medical marijuana there since 1996, and we know anyone can get a medical marijuana card if they want one. But, per capita marijuana use in California is only slightly higher than the national average. Use by those 12 to 17 years of age is actually slightly lower than the national average. There are several states that have not decriminalized and that do not have medical marijuana where per capita use of marijuana is higher. The laws don't have much impact on the percentage of people who will smoke pot.

When we think about laws from the perspective of the science of criminal justice we think about deterrent effect. What influences the level of deterrent effect are things like the severity of the punishment for breaking a law and something most people don't even think about, and that is the level of risk of getting caught by those who contemplate breaking a law. That last one is really the biggie here. The fact is that most pot smokers will never get caught provided they are just a little bit careful. Most all the transactions and use of this drug go on behind closed doors or somewhere where no one but the participants are going to see it. Well over half of all murders will result in an arrest. Probably one in several thousand “pot smokings” result in an arrest, and usually it's because the pot smokers was doing something stupid. We do have something like 700,000 people arrested in this country for simple possession of pot every year, but that only re[presents a very small percentage of pot smokers and I can tell you that from many years of working in the criminal justice system, and I've worked both as a prosecutor and a defense attorney, a lot of these people getting caught are getting caught over and over again, because they are idiots. A lot of them are criminals who are always getting in trouble for something who happen to break the marijuana laws along with all their other law breaking, or they're stupid young people who think it's a good idea to drive around in their cars smoking from three foot bongs or something like that. They're idiots. The vast majority of pot smokers will never get caught, even if they are regular smokers for decades.

People know there is very little likelihood they'll get caught and they know that not much will happen to most of them in the unlikely event that they do get caught. (or at least that's what they think.) And most are young people when they start fooling around with it, young people who feel invincible anyway. Even if they are idiots likely to get caught they don't know that. They know hardly anyone ever gets caught and they think it won't happen to them either.

I truly don't believe that there are many who don't smoke pot just because it is illegal. It's relatively cheap on a per use basis and easily available anywhere. We could hardly make it more available if we tried. It's not that people can't afford it or they can't find it, it's that they don't want to do it. And I think what makes most not want to do it are mostly all the good reasons not to do it that have nothing to do with its legal status. And those few who really want to do it but won't just because it's illegal, they wouldn't be much of a problem for us if we did legalize it. They've already shown that they have some self control by not doing something they really want to do and they've already shown that they are basically law abiding people.

We are stopping precious few people from smoking pot with our laws. What we are doing is wasting an absolute fortune trying to keep up the ban on marijuana. We're causing a rift between law enforcement and a significantly portion of our society. We're causing a situation we're millions of people regularly break the law thus eroding respect for the rule of law in general. We're enriching organized crime to the tune of many billions of dollars a year. Most of what Mexican drug trafficking organizations make is coming from marijuana sales. We're really accomplishing nothing good but we are causing problems too numerous to list. I understand your objections to pot smoking, but it makes no sense to me to have an unenforceable law that is causing way more harm than good.

[taildragger]

I can't even read this without my head exploding at the concept.

How about drilling off Santa-Barba, Reducing Gov't Spending, and cutting all aid to Illegals so that they leave?

Instead, embark in another culturally destructive government sponsored paradigm changer which will spread throughout the country and turn us all into the $&!+hole that Kalipornia has become....

I think not....

[Melinda]

I told you, I've lived in a foreign country that controls every statistic going in and out of its borders. That alone is lesson enough to create a healthy skepticism that has served me very well in life. If you haven't, then you can't begin to understand what I'm talking about. A “statistic” coming from Morocco is meaningless. I don't believe, I know. Why don't you start with some of Paul Bowles writings about this one country, and conclude that it is not insular in the world as to its backwardness by a long shot. LOL, would you trust a drug statistic from Afghanistan?

[Ken H]

Both of your posts I replied were talking about The Netherlands. Why did you switch to talking about third world countries?

Apparently you cannot back up what you said about The Netherlands.

[dalereed]

I don’t drink and anyone that smokes marijuana belongs in prison!!!!!

[MAD-AS-HELL]

even cancer patients that use it to help them have an appetite and to help suppress their pain?

[dalereed]

YES!!!

[Melinda]

Sorry, I don't see money being wasted by enforcing the law simply because a lot of idiot people find it easy to break. If our laws no longer reflect the will of the majority of the people they govern, well, we know what that means.

Let's legalize prostitution, any and all drugs, why not remove all laws that don't involve bodily or economic harm to another person from the perp. The truth is, no one can assure anyone that smoking pot is truly without a victim. We are busy banning smoking tobacco decades after being told it was a victimless pursuit, when in reality, it is not. We all pay escalated health costs associated with lung cancer born from smoking tobacco. And now we find cancer-causing secondhand smoke effects innocents. Marijuana is exempt from harming the lungs? Sure it is, LOL. All this effort to legalize it should ensure positive progression in all societies, right? The ugly truth is that societies that turn their backs on drug use are well below the standard of living level that I or my family want to live in or ever dream to achieve.

The will of the majority should prevail, and those who want to smoke it should move to states whose laws are lax, like mine. We are already at the bottom of the economic ladder having been mismanaged by a corrupt, one-party government, we can't afford to prosecute the lawbreakers, are losing population yearly, so we are busy loosening our laws, trying to attract potheads, as we think they will add substantially to the gene and economic pool. I hear CA is in a similar predicament.