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War on Drugs - Taxes on Tobacco

 
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PostPosted: Sun Jul 05, 2015 8:09 am    Post subject: War on Drugs - Taxes on Tobacco Reply with quote

PeakTrader:

“…taxes on tobacco products…”

Excessive taxes, along with legal costs, raises prices and reduces employment. Ultimately, consumers and workers pay.

However, social costs are reduced, although tobacco products used in moderation likely has little or no effect.

Some states legalized marijuana. When you legalize something, you get more of it, and when you tax something, you get less of it.

The scientific, medical, and economic evidence shows marijuana is far more dangerous and costly to society than tobacco.

Of course, when you legalize and tax, you end up with more users (e.g. alcohol and tobacco).

So, social costs increase.

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Baffling, it seems, 99% of the articles on drugs, including marijuana, is pro-drug propaganda.

Some people use only marijuana and some only alcohol. However, marijuana and alcohol is a powerful combination.

And, you can’t get drunk on a glass of wine.

The “War on Drugs,” including on marijuana, has saved the U.S. trillions of dollars in social costs, which include lost productivity, traffic & work injuries & fatalities, health problems & drug treatment, mental illness, unemployment, crime, domestic violence, child abuse, and other social services.

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“The Journal of the American Medical Association reported, based on a study of 300 sets of twins, that marijuana-using twins were four times more likely than their siblings to use cocaine and crack cocaine, and five times more likely to use hallucinogens such as LSD.”

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American College of Pediatricians, June 2010
Marijuana Use: Legalization Not a Good Idea

“The negative physical and mental effects of marijuana use are well documented. It’s associated with lower educational accomplishment, lower work productivity, increased risks of motor vehicle accidents, and heart and lung disease. All forms of cannabis are mind-altering drugs due to delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the main active chemical in marijuana. THC affects nerve cells in the region of the brain where memories are formed. This makes it difficult for the user to recall recent events. Chronic exposure to THC may hasten the age related loss of nerve cells. Marijuana impairs a person’s judgment, coordination, balance, ability to pay attention and reaction time. Cannabis use in adolescence is a predictor of depression in later life. Cannabis induces psychotic symptoms and cognitive impairment in some individuals. Numerous mechanisms have been postulated for the link between cannabis use and attention deficits, psychotic symptoms, and neural desynchronization. Studies indicate that it impairs driving performance in the same way alcohol does, with users displaying the same lack of coordination on standard sobriety tests. Marijuana is second only to alcohol as a factor contributing to traffic accidents involving loss of life. Students who regularly use marijuana have lower grade and test scores and are less likely to achieve personal goals. Marijuana smokers often jeopardize their future by engaging in risky practices or committing criminal acts.”

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AMERICAN ACADEMY OF PEDIATRICS
Marijuana: A Continuing Concern for Pediatricians

“The abuse of marijuana by adolescents is a major health problem with social, academic, developmental, and legal ramifications. Marijuana is an addictive, mind-altering drug capable of inducing dependency.

There is little doubt that marijuana intoxication contributes substantially to accidental deaths and injuries among adolescents, especially those associated with motor vehicle crashes, and is frequently involved in incidents related to driving while intoxicated.

Adolescents who use marijuana are 104 times as likely to use cocaine compared with peers who never smoked marijuana.”

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Examining the Impact of Marijuana Legalization on Marijuana Consumption
Insights from the Economics Literature

“From this review it is clear that total consumption will rise in response to legalization due to increases in the number of new users, increases in the number of regular and heavy users, and probable increases in the duration in which marijuana is consumed for average users.”

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Marijuana Use Can Threaten Teen’s Academic Success
Mar 15 2007

“Some factions of society still try to perpetrate the myth that marijuana is nothing more than a harmless and misunderstood drug no more dangerous than alcohol or cigarettes. The bottom line is that marijuana and other illegal drugs have real and proven negative effects on teen academic performance.

Marijuana and underage drinking are linked to higher dropout rates. Students who drink or use drugs frequently are up to five times more likely than their peers to drop out of high school. A teenage marijuana user’s odds of dropping out are more than twice that of a non-user.

“In fact, studies show that heavy marijuana use impairs a teen’s ability to concentrate and retain information. And this is especially problematic during these peak learning and testing years” said Larry S. Fields, M.D., F.A.A.F.P. and President of the American Academy of Family Physicians.””

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Legalizing Marijuana Not Worth the Costs
CNBC
20 Apr 2010

“State governments are exploring convenient fixes for overcoming massive debts burdening their states… some legislators are proposing the legalization of marijuana to boost tax revenue.

…findings from a white paper by the California Police Chiefs Association’s Task Force on Marijuana Dispensaries: California legalized “medical” marijuana in 1996, and dispensaries where the drug is handed out – to pretty much whoever comes in with a doctor’s note – have become catalysts for serious crime.”

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The Economics of Drug Legalization – 1995

“Proponents of legalization suggest that their policy will save society money…First, we will not have to pay police to enforce the present criminal-justice approach to drug usage. Second, we will be able to tax legal drugs, thereby raising revenue.

The FY 1994 federal budget allocates $7.51 billion for drug control (supply reduction) which includes criminal justice, interdiction, international programs and intelligence. State and local governments spend even more, $12.6 billion a year.

The total revenue collected from alcohol taxes at the federal, state, and local levels amounts to about $13.1 billion a year, a paltry sum compared to the social costs associated with alcohol consumption.

We spend approximately $20 billion a year on drug control activities. If drugs were legalized, we would see an increase in addiction rates.

Consequently we would have more crack babies (the kind that already will cost the system $90 billion), decreased productivity (at a cost of between $140 billion and $210 billion), more job-related accidents, and more dead people.

And given the potential black market effect, it is unlikely that we could raise even several billion dollars in tax revenue.

From a purely economic standpoint, legalization is not cost effective.”

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WhiteHouse.Gov:

“Most people whose only crime is marijuana possession do not go to prison. A survey by the Bureau of Justice Statistics showed that 0.7% of all state inmates were behind bars for marijuana possession only (with many of them pleading down from more serious crimes).”

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Is Illinois winning the War on Drugs?
Chicago Tribune
July 24, 2011

“Jack Riley, special agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration in Chicago…noted that Chicago’s decreasing crime is an important indicator that the so-called War on Drugs is working.

About 70 percent of all crime can be traced to drugs, he said, and crime in the city is at its lowest in years.

“They (police, DEA, etc.) believe in what we’re doing because they see the devastation drugs are causing.””

****

“Former New York City Mayor Ed Koch described drug legalization as “the equivalent of extinguishing a fire with napalm.”

Joseph Califano, the author and a member of President Johnson’s cabinet, stated: “Drugs like marijuana and cocaine are not dangerous because they are illegal; they are illegal because they are dangerous.”

William J. Bennett, former director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy…”legalized alcohol, which is responsible for some 100,000 deaths a year, is hardly the model for drug policy.””

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Baffling, alcohol is legal. Yet, many people who drink also take drugs.

Will adding marijuana to liquor stores help “a young black male?”

There’s a positive correlation between drugs and crime, particularly violent and property crimes.

If the federal government’s data are wrong, then it would have no credibility and be worthless.

And, you continue to confuse a poor federal government policy with “the financial industry.”

****

I’m sure, risky behavior is a component, like driving a car with marijuana.

I guess, you don’t mind people, particularly “minorities,” driving around high.

How do you know marijuana itself doesn’t cause irresponsible behavior or poor judgment?

So, you believe “a young black male” will be better off legalizing marijuana, because he won’t be arrested.

****

Baffling, so, your point, that I missed, is “we made it illegal based on cultural bias and not good science.”

And, when you say “stigma associated with an arrest record,” you’re innocent until proven guilty.

If you’re constantly getting arrested, maybe you should ask yourself if you’re doing something wrong.

Aren’t we fortunate you know the medical community is wrong, the scientific studies are wrong, and the economics are wrong.

We can rely on the extensive propaganda by activists, who either want to sell marijuana, feel guilty about contributing to drug related crimes, e.g. in Mexico and other places, or who just don’t care, because getting high is what’s important.

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Menzie Chinn, I didn’t imply the U.S. criminal justice system is perfect, ideal, or fair. It may never be. There may always be exceptions.

However, on the other side, the U.S. criminal justice system may be the best in the world. It’s certainly the best at catching criminals.

That’s not the case in many countries around the world, where criminals run amok or actually control the countryside.

And, some countries are incompetent at catching criminals.

For example:

Sweden’s unsolved violent crime rate at 95 percent
15 November 2008

“Robberies and violent crimes made up 75 percent of all reported crimes in Sweden last year, which added up to around 900,000. Police managed to solve 5.8 percent of them. Bengt Svenson, the national police chief, defended his department saying: “There is often very little of value to work with. When it comes to theft, there are no witnesses, and victims often don’t know when the crime occurred. There’s really not much to go on and that obviously makes it hard to solve crimes.

”Justice Minister Beatrice Ask feels the figures are an unwelcome truth for a government that ran on a platform on crime reduction. When elected, the government promised to have 20,000 police on Sweden’s streets by 2010. Ask feels that part of the problem lies with Sweden’s culture. “I think it has to do with the culture, the idea that there is simply nothing that can be done.” At any rate, Ask says she feels the statistics are rather disturbing and that the Swedish police could do more to clear up these cases.”

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