Pros And Cons Of Legalization Of Marijuana

The issue at hand that we chose to write about is the legalization of cannabis, also known as marijuana. From Wikipedia, since as early as 1619 the regulation of marijuana began in the United States, and since then there have always been debates and conflicts within state and federal laws about how it should be regulated. Many have used marijuana for spiritual, medical, and recreational uses. And some will argue the many pros and cons to legalizing recreational marijuana. To begin with, according to drugrehab.us some pros of legalizing marijuana in the states would be the large amounts of revenue that it brings in. Every state has rising costs and is always looking for opportunities to boost their revenue. Huffingtonpost.com states that

“ Therefore, billions of dollars could be generated from taxing marijuana purchases just as alcohol and tobacco sales have profited from consumers. Lastly, local and state governments currently spend a massive amount of money just trying to keep a regulation on marijuana. Having a tax on the recreational distribution of it could save the large amounts of money already being spent. The major con of this solution for this is the social impact of legalizing marijuana. Many say that if legalized it will still contribute to violence and crime in the states. On the contrary with violence and crime, drugrehab.us believes that if legalized then law enforcement officers would actually have more time to focus and spend more time on other serious crimes. Organized crime has grown throughout the years, and the illegal drug trade has been the bread and butter for the cartels. On another note, even if it is not legalized it will still be a very profitable drug. So why not take the profits away from the illegal trade and use it towards building our deficit? From a medical doctor’s standpoint on the matter, on medicalmarijuana.procon.org, Former US Surgeon General, Joycelyn Elders states that there is an overwhelming amount of evidence that marijuana