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When enforcement or the news (being very generous here to qualify torontolife.com as news) come up with these numbers, they often use the retail value of drugs.
by ornornor 5y ago
When enforcement or the news (being very generous here to qualify torontolife.com as news) come up with these numbers, they often use the retail value of drugs.
For instance, the big players sell drugs in kilos or dozen of kilos but enforcement calculates the value at the street price of an ounce. It makes for bigger and more impressive numbers but isn’t the reality. When we value a mining company for instance, we’re talking about bulk ore value, not finished retail products made out of that ore value.
21B is a lot of money, but it’s probably not very close to the actual amount.
- moonchrome 5y agoThat doesn't really change his point, even if that 20B isn't captured by the syndicate it's the street value of the goods they provides to consumers. I would say that the kind of value captured by illigal activity is usually from pathological market cases and you really don't want this value captured (we already had a period where cocaine was added to soft drinks, I'm sure if you launch that you would create massive "value". Doubt this is a society most here would want to live in.
- adminscoffee 5y agoactually, eventually that kilo will be broken down and sold to smaller dealers who will then bring up the price to street value. so even if the value is sold slightly above cost, there's a lot of people buying from that wholesaler and reselling it to smaller dealers who then step on it more. so the number could vary depending on market forces
- hef19898 5y agoThat is one of the core messages from Narconomics, one of the reasons I love the book. Drugs are a business, and Narconomics has a point when recommending that we look at the drug problem from a business perspective. Obviously we don't, but we should.