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Re: regulated markets Pot prices are low because they aren't taxed according to your suggested system. Once you start factoring in all the perceived negative e

by VMG 13y ago

Re: regulated markets Pot prices are low because they aren't taxed according to your suggested system. Once you start factoring in all the perceived negative effects the drug has on it's users (ignoring the positive effects, as you said), the price shoots up. Silk Roads will continue to exist. Re: glue sniffing So under your system, substances that can be abused as drugs while not marketed as drugs (also "bath salts") will be much cheaper than the regulated, taxed alternatives. Let my clarify my position: regulation and heavy taxation of drugs is ineffective, unjustified and will have bad outcomes. Society fares better if individuals are made responsible for their choices.

dredmorbius 13y ago
regulation and heavy taxation of drugs is ineffective, unjustified and will have bad outcomes. Alcohol is regulated and taxed. Tobacco is regulated and taxed. Decongestants, cough syrup, and spray paint (not a drug, but a problematic retail good) are regulated, if not uniformly taxed. There are limits to effective regulation, yes, but that's no reason to throw your hands in the air and abandon all of it, which is what you seem to advise. You're continuing to misrepresent my statement (I'm not "ignoring" positive effects, I am capturing negative externalities). And you've dodged and avoided the matter of personal responsibility as I've iterated it several times in accruing those negative externalities to those on whom the responsibility for them lies. Why in your scheme of things should the cost of social ills be allocated to all while the benefits accrue only to a select few? That's precisely the same situation as exists in much of the present global financial markets where financial gains are privatized while losses are socialized. This generates marked adverse incentive and moral hazard problems. In some circumstances (but not all) the mechanism of that has been government action, but the point is that regulation and action can have the effect of capturing or socializing externalities. My argument is that the capitalist market system works best when both profits and costs can be appropriately allocated to those on whom they are attributable. There are many cases where this requires significant intervention in market mechanisms, usually where boundaries of property (e.g., public health, pollution, broadcast of authored works) cannot be otherwise readily determined or enforced. There's a reason Libertarianism remains a largely prepubescent pipe dream. It's a fantasy world.

by VMG 13y ago

dredmorbius 13y ago

regulation and heavy taxation of drugs is ineffective, unjustified and will have bad outcomes. Alcohol is regulated and taxed. Tobacco is regulated and taxed. Decongestants, cough syrup, and spray paint (not a drug, but a problematic retail good) are regulated, if not uniformly taxed. There are limits to effective regulation, yes, but that's no reason to throw your hands in the air and abandon all of it, which is what you seem to advise. You're continuing to misrepresent my statement (I'm not "ignoring" positive effects, I am capturing negative externalities). And you've dodged and avoided the matter of personal responsibility as I've iterated it several times in accruing those negative externalities to those on whom the responsibility for them lies. Why in your scheme of things should the cost of social ills be allocated to all while the benefits accrue only to a select few? That's precisely the same situation as exists in much of the present global financial markets where financial gains are privatized while losses are socialized. This generates marked adverse incentive and moral hazard problems. In some circumstances (but not all) the mechanism of that has been government action, but the point is that regulation and action can have the effect of capturing or socializing externalities. My argument is that the capitalist market system works best when both profits and costs can be appropriately allocated to those on whom they are attributable. There are many cases where this requires significant intervention in market mechanisms, usually where boundaries of property (e.g., public health, pollution, broadcast of authored works) cannot be otherwise readily determined or enforced. There's a reason Libertarianism remains a largely prepubescent pipe dream. It's a fantasy world.