A Closer Look at the Cons of Legalizing Marijuana

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Marijuana Essay It has been a discussion for decades, is the cost of fighting marijuana use worth the cost to tax payers and society? Like all drugs there are health effects to the people using Marijuana and those having to be around the smoke. Unlike other drugs marijuana seems to render its users well, useless. The long debates over legalizing marijuana have ebbed and flowed from not legalizing because it’s a gateway drug to legalizing to make it less desirable and of course the tax revenue it would bring in. Colorado and Washington both decided to legalize marijuana for recreational use and the country has been engrossed in how it will play out. As long as the government stands firm on marijuana being an illegal substance the only people that win are the users. Let’s explore why legalizing marijuana is not such a good idea. Some states believe that legalizing marijuana will lower cost in the legislative branch of local, state, and even federal levels. States could greatly favor legalizing marijuana as the majority of criminal prosecution and housing falls on the state with very few marijuana cases going all the way to the federal level. It would be easy to see why a state would be more the happy to legalize marijuana as the cost of enforcing anti-marijuana laws go down and tax revenue goes up. According to marijuana-statistics.com “There were a total of 1,846,351 state and local arrests for drug abuse violations in the United States during 2005. Of the drug arrests, 4.9% were for marijuana sale/manufacturing and 37.7% were for marijuana possession.” (marijuana-statistics.com) This tells me that 37.7% of these arrests would already be eliminated from state cost with legalization. The other 4.9% would become potential re... ... middle of paper ... ...arch Complete, Ipswich, MA. Accessed March 30, 2014. Crombie, Noelle. "Marijuana News: Colorado Governor Warns Other States about Legalizing Pot." Oregonian. Oregon Live, 27 Feb. 2014. Web. 30 Mar. 30. Hartman H. Legalized Marijuana and the Workplace: Preparing for the Trend. Employee Relations Law Journal [serial online]. Spring2013 2013;38(4):72-75. Available from: Legal Collection, Ipswich, MA. Accessed March 30, 2014. "Marijuana: Facts Parents Need to Know." DRUGABUSE.GOV. NIDA Drugs Publishing, Mar. 2014. Web. 30 Mar. 2014"Marijuana Statistics." Marijuana-statistics.com. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, n.d. Web. 30 Mar. 2014. Shaw M. Legalized Pot Now a High Priority. ENR: Engineering News-Record [serial online]. January 20, 2014;282(3):8. Available from: Academic Search Complete, Ipswich, MA. Accessed March 30, 2014

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