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Legalizing all drugs would kill these cartels almost instantly. People who do drugs do them anyway and find a way to even if they’re illegal. If drugs weren’t

Legalizing all drugs would kill these cartels almost instantly. People who do drugs do them anyway and find a way to even if they’re illegal. If drugs weren’t illegal all that money wouldnt end up in mexican cartels pockets.

jimbob45 6y ago
I’ve read that the cartels have diversified their businesses enough that this is no longer true. Do you have a source?
- grugagag 6y ago
  Source for what? Currently US dollars are entering the cartels pockets, big dollars and there’s no secret. And naturally they scaled up the operations because the demand is high. If drugs became legal demand would go down and it would cut into their operations “biggly”.
eanzenberg 6y ago
This is untrue, as drug cartels still make tons of weed to sell in areas where it’s already legalized.
- tw04 6y ago
  Citation please? The profit that Colorado and other states are reporting makes it hard to believe the black market is even a shadow of its former self in those states.
  - azinman2 6y ago
    https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-07-20/california-weighs-steep-new-fines-illegal-pot-industry https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-07-20/californ...
    - stjohnswarts 6y ago
      If they hadn't made it so expensive artificially then the illegal guys couldn't make enough profit to make it worth their time to sell illegally. The California canibus market is a terrible example of what a market should be.
  - asdff 6y ago
    In California, the black market is estimated as twice the size of the legal market (1). This is the natural result when you make it excruciatingly difficult to open legal businesses, and impose in some municipalities (including Los Angeles) north of 30% taxes on product with no break given for medical patients who might rely on this for their disease. There is also a lack of enforcement of illegal dispensaries, which contributes to there being at least 2835 illegal dispensaries compared to 873 licensed dispensaries state wide (2). 1. https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-08-14/californias-biggest-legal-marijuana-market https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-08-14/californ... 2. https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-09-11/california-marijuana-black-market-dwarfs-legal-pot-industry https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-09-11/californ...
- CamperBob2 6y ago
  Yes, just as they still smuggle tobacco products into areas where they are perceived to be excessively taxed. The problem is overtaxation, not the nature of the product.
theptip 6y ago
Indeed. In the US the focus is typically on the drugs that come north, but it’s not just dollars that flow back south, it’s also weapons, which further destabilize the drug producing/transit countries.
- grugagag 6y ago
  I wouldnt be surprised if drug cartels and weapon manufacturers lobby to keep the situation unchanged.
stephentmcm 6y ago
This is absolutely not going to be the case. Assuming both the US and Mexico simultaneous legalized all drugs, what happens to all the illegal jobs the cartels currently have? Their people, money and weapons don't vanish and what we see when cartels take a hit income is violence increases and the cartels look to other methods of making income using they're existing tools. Protection rackets and kidnappings are already used as supplemental income, these would only increase. Now a long approach of gradual decriminalization and legalization may work, with the ability to operate legally the need to utilize violence decreases over time as it's generally bad for business.
- rexpop 6y ago
  Wow, your response is literally "let them hold us hostage, it's safer than upsetting the status quo."
  - stephentmcm 6y ago
    >Now a long approach of gradual decriminalization and legalization may work, with the ability to operate legally the need to utilize violence decreases over time as it's generally bad for business. For the record I'm pro-legalization, but just flipping the status quo overnight isn't going to fly here. Saying "just legalize all drugs" doesn't solve the problem, someone still has to make the drugs, can we just give all traffickers amnesty for past crimes and make their operations legal? Maybe? But it's not something to hand-wave away. I don't have the answer but flippant comments about how easy it is to dismantle cartels, is offensive to anyone who has fought to do such and likely a disservice to the intelligence of people running them.
    - grugagag 6y ago
      No, it's not easy to dismantle cartels and that is because of how much money and power they amassed under the current status quo. But making drugs legal would definitely cut the cartels funding and they would eventually dwindle into obscurity and small time crime. The current power of the cartels is only due to the big money that are in the game, hundreds of billions of dollars a year!!
hindsightbias 6y ago
We legalized weed and it didnt make a dent. Theyre literally killing the competition for the avocado you bought yesterday. Narcos are entrenched and not going anywhere anymore than Russian oligarchs.
- iciac 6y ago
  https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/how-legalizing-marijuana-securing-border-border-wall-drug-smuggling https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/how-legali... Cato report (2018) on the effects of marijuana legalization on border smuggling. It's had a large and direct impact on the market.
jdhbbbhb 6y ago
This is the most naive comment I have seen. You do not understand the cartels integration in all parts of life. They control the government. They control business.
everdumb 6y ago
Is that really a proven fact? Ending Prohibition didn't end the Mafia.
spicyramen 6y ago
That's actually a myth. During past government in Mexico drug cartels started kidnapping and stealing oil to the point that oil income was higher than drugs. There's an active case from Pemex against BASF and other Houston based company to buy oil from drug cartels at cheaper price.
kumarvvr 6y ago
The fear of punishments probably keeps many kids / young adults off drugs. The fear of incarceration and a criminal record probably does more to keep people off drugs than actual incarceration. I find the argument for legalizing drugs as some sort of a benevolent all-in-one solution a complete idiotic solution. Drugs like Heroin, Meth, Cocaine, etc should absolutely be banned and IMV the scope and scale of punishments increased. Humans are notoriously incompetent or weak-willed to make rational choices in many aspects. They are emotional, impulsive and irrational. Imagine being able to obtain drugs at market prices and being able to sell to children in schools, illegally of course. Can you not see what is happening with alcohol? Drugs are a social evil and must be dealt with. Legalization is not the solution. It will increase drug use exponentially.
- grugagag 6y ago
  The fear of punishment can be replaced with the fear of becoming a junkie and education can prevent that. Sure, some will become junkies and so be it, it's their life and that choice belongs to them. When I say legalizing drugs I don't mean encouraging them. Drugs like Heroin, Meth, Coke (and the list doesn't end here) are indeed dangerous and disgusting, but people still do them and the reason is because their lives are messed up or they themselves are messed up. If drugs were legal accessible junkies wouldn't need to turn into criminals. With illegal drugs there is a great incentive by drug dealers to hook more and more people up and make them do whatever it takes to get their next dose. If the next dose is very easy to get and cheap I bet you'd either not see junkies come to light or a lot of them would be semi-functional and be on drugs throughout their lives without many of us not even be aware of it. The fear will come from seeing irresponsible people ruin their lives and not wanting to be one of them. Alcohol too has a high potential of abuse and yet not a large number of people abuse it as it was thought during the prohibition.
asdff 6y ago
The cartels will still be in businesses if the legal option included a 30% tax, as we see in California with the legal weed business.

jimbob45 6y ago

I’ve read that the cartels have diversified their businesses enough that this is no longer true. Do you have a source?

grugagag 6y ago
Source for what? Currently US dollars are entering the cartels pockets, big dollars and there’s no secret. And naturally they scaled up the operations because the demand is high. If drugs became legal demand would go down and it would cut into their operations “biggly”.

eanzenberg 6y ago

This is untrue, as drug cartels still make tons of weed to sell in areas where it’s already legalized.

tw04 6y ago
Citation please? The profit that Colorado and other states are reporting makes it hard to believe the black market is even a shadow of its former self in those states.
- azinman2 6y ago
  https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-07-20/california-weighs-steep-new-fines-illegal-pot-industry https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-07-20/californ...
  - stjohnswarts 6y ago
    If they hadn't made it so expensive artificially then the illegal guys couldn't make enough profit to make it worth their time to sell illegally. The California canibus market is a terrible example of what a market should be.
- asdff 6y ago
  In California, the black market is estimated as twice the size of the legal market (1). This is the natural result when you make it excruciatingly difficult to open legal businesses, and impose in some municipalities (including Los Angeles) north of 30% taxes on product with no break given for medical patients who might rely on this for their disease. There is also a lack of enforcement of illegal dispensaries, which contributes to there being at least 2835 illegal dispensaries compared to 873 licensed dispensaries state wide (2). 1. https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-08-14/californias-biggest-legal-marijuana-market https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-08-14/californ... 2. https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-09-11/california-marijuana-black-market-dwarfs-legal-pot-industry https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-09-11/californ...
CamperBob2 6y ago
Yes, just as they still smuggle tobacco products into areas where they are perceived to be excessively taxed. The problem is overtaxation, not the nature of the product.

theptip 6y ago

Indeed. In the US the focus is typically on the drugs that come north, but it’s not just dollars that flow back south, it’s also weapons, which further destabilize the drug producing/transit countries.

grugagag 6y ago
I wouldnt be surprised if drug cartels and weapon manufacturers lobby to keep the situation unchanged.

stephentmcm 6y ago

This is absolutely not going to be the case. Assuming both the US and Mexico simultaneous legalized all drugs, what happens to all the illegal jobs the cartels currently have? Their people, money and weapons don't vanish and what we see when cartels take a hit income is violence increases and the cartels look to other methods of making income using they're existing tools. Protection rackets and kidnappings are already used as supplemental income, these would only increase. Now a long approach of gradual decriminalization and legalization may work, with the ability to operate legally the need to utilize violence decreases over time as it's generally bad for business.

rexpop 6y ago
Wow, your response is literally "let them hold us hostage, it's safer than upsetting the status quo."
- stephentmcm 6y ago
  >Now a long approach of gradual decriminalization and legalization may work, with the ability to operate legally the need to utilize violence decreases over time as it's generally bad for business. For the record I'm pro-legalization, but just flipping the status quo overnight isn't going to fly here. Saying "just legalize all drugs" doesn't solve the problem, someone still has to make the drugs, can we just give all traffickers amnesty for past crimes and make their operations legal? Maybe? But it's not something to hand-wave away. I don't have the answer but flippant comments about how easy it is to dismantle cartels, is offensive to anyone who has fought to do such and likely a disservice to the intelligence of people running them.
  - grugagag 6y ago
    No, it's not easy to dismantle cartels and that is because of how much money and power they amassed under the current status quo. But making drugs legal would definitely cut the cartels funding and they would eventually dwindle into obscurity and small time crime. The current power of the cartels is only due to the big money that are in the game, hundreds of billions of dollars a year!!

hindsightbias 6y ago

We legalized weed and it didnt make a dent. Theyre literally killing the competition for the avocado you bought yesterday. Narcos are entrenched and not going anywhere anymore than Russian oligarchs.

iciac 6y ago
https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/how-legalizing-marijuana-securing-border-border-wall-drug-smuggling https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/how-legali... Cato report (2018) on the effects of marijuana legalization on border smuggling. It's had a large and direct impact on the market.

jdhbbbhb 6y ago

This is the most naive comment I have seen. You do not understand the cartels integration in all parts of life. They control the government. They control business.

everdumb 6y ago

Is that really a proven fact? Ending Prohibition didn't end the Mafia.

spicyramen 6y ago

That's actually a myth. During past government in Mexico drug cartels started kidnapping and stealing oil to the point that oil income was higher than drugs. There's an active case from Pemex against BASF and other Houston based company to buy oil from drug cartels at cheaper price.

kumarvvr 6y ago

The fear of punishments probably keeps many kids / young adults off drugs. The fear of incarceration and a criminal record probably does more to keep people off drugs than actual incarceration. I find the argument for legalizing drugs as some sort of a benevolent all-in-one solution a complete idiotic solution. Drugs like Heroin, Meth, Cocaine, etc should absolutely be banned and IMV the scope and scale of punishments increased. Humans are notoriously incompetent or weak-willed to make rational choices in many aspects. They are emotional, impulsive and irrational. Imagine being able to obtain drugs at market prices and being able to sell to children in schools, illegally of course. Can you not see what is happening with alcohol? Drugs are a social evil and must be dealt with. Legalization is not the solution. It will increase drug use exponentially.

grugagag 6y ago
The fear of punishment can be replaced with the fear of becoming a junkie and education can prevent that. Sure, some will become junkies and so be it, it's their life and that choice belongs to them. When I say legalizing drugs I don't mean encouraging them. Drugs like Heroin, Meth, Coke (and the list doesn't end here) are indeed dangerous and disgusting, but people still do them and the reason is because their lives are messed up or they themselves are messed up. If drugs were legal accessible junkies wouldn't need to turn into criminals. With illegal drugs there is a great incentive by drug dealers to hook more and more people up and make them do whatever it takes to get their next dose. If the next dose is very easy to get and cheap I bet you'd either not see junkies come to light or a lot of them would be semi-functional and be on drugs throughout their lives without many of us not even be aware of it. The fear will come from seeing irresponsible people ruin their lives and not wanting to be one of them. Alcohol too has a high potential of abuse and yet not a large number of people abuse it as it was thought during the prohibition.

asdff 6y ago

The cartels will still be in businesses if the legal option included a 30% tax, as we see in California with the legal weed business.