Tomatoes are a multi-billion dollar industry in the US =>
Fresh and processed tomatoes account for more than $2 billion in annual farm cash receipts.
http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/crops/vegetables-pulses/tomatoes.aspx
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Make it legal and everyone would grow their own.
CA has allowed medical mj patients to grow their own since 1997, yet the state annually collects $100M in taxes on $1B in sales. Business is booming!
How much is invested in growing all those tomatoes, how many employees? Very few farmers are getting rich, and zero of the employees.
The states would make zero or close to that if pot was totally legal. Everyone could easily grow all they could possibly use. Unlike tomatoes, it won’t spoil and is easy to freeze.
Tomatoes have to be picked at perfect ripeness, they then have a very short shelf life. That isn’t the case with pot, harvest, dry, into a zip-lock and toss in the freezer.