Jalpha wrote:I'm interested in the socio-economic impacts over the long term so I haven't checked up on the situation in a while. Never heard of a stoned person shooting, stabbing or assaulting someone but I can't say the same for drunks. I have heard of a lot of stoners never getting work though.
Industrially it seems to produce what is perhaps the best natural fiber. Making paper from the fibers also seems like a much better alternative than the current method of using pulpwood. I think a lot of the other proposed uses are marginally useful if not outright unreasonable however.
I think I read somewhere that European tourism to Colorado went up 200%.
There are tons of tour packages and weed friendly hotels there now.
http://medicalmarijuana.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=000881It's completely legal for anyone to use in the states of Colorado and Washington. It's basically under the same system of regulation as alcohol there. But this does mean that it's up to the local government on how they want it to be sold so it's harder to get in some cities than others. It also means you can't use it on the street in public, sort of like the old Amsterdam laws. Both of these states are basically the freest places in the world to smoke weed outside of Uruguay. It's much easier to get and smoke weed in Colorado than it is in Amsterdam now but it's harder to get other drugs that you can get in the Netherlands.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-25328656It's under prescription laws in 19 other states and Washington D.C. This varies incredibly by state. In California it's up to the doctor so you can basically pay $50 and say you have stress and you can then use it legally. In my neighboring state of Michigan it's much harder to get. You have to have documented pain, cancer or some very specific illnesses to get it. In almost all the medically legal states you can use it in public which is a nice perk. Generally neighboring states recognize the legal status for drug holders from the other state. I've seen police in Wisconsin catch a guy with a med card from Michigan smoking outside a bar and he was holding an 8th and they gave it back to him and let him go.
Many of the other non-legal, non-medical states also have localities where it's basically legal up to a point. Europeans don't usually understand that although the State or Federal government makes it illegal, in most cases it's up to the locality to determine the penalty for small amounts of drugs. In my home state it's generally only a misdemeanor crime up to a pound of weed. In my home town of Madison WI you only get the equivalent of a parking ticket for any possesion of marijuana up to a quarter ounce. You pay it and there's no record of it.
There are some very backwards states where that amount will get you a year in jail or more. Texas, Mississippi and most of the old idiotic, conservative american-apartheid southern states have extremely serious drug laws. Here's an example of how ludicrous and backwards the Southern United States can be.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobsullum/2014/05/22/how-a-batch-of-hash-brownies-can-get-you-a-life-sentence-in-texas/My favorite line from the prosecutor that just shows that even he thinks the law is idiotic.
“As prosecutors we are bound by what the law is,” says Brunner, “not what the law should be or could be. In Texas possession of THC oil is illegal, whether it is sitting in a tiny jar on the shelf or baked into an big batch of brownies. It is illegal—period. Unless the law changes, we will continue to prosecute such cases.”
Most of these idiotic laws were made during the Reagan Drug War years and have never been changed to reflect reality. Avoid these states at all costs in general. They usually also have the worst alcohol laws, with limits on beer quality at 3.5% alcohol and extremely restrictive liquor laws and sales as well.
