Bad economy could mean legalization of marijuana is on it’s way…. By: Brian Blomberg

9. September 2009 by student.

          Have you ever thought what it would be like if Marijuana was legalized? Would young teenagers still have the thrill of doing this drug?  I think that if this drug was legalized then teens would not feel the peer pressure that they need to fit in with everyone else, like what most of them feel today. There are many good things that could come from this legalization. A Harvard professor Jeffrey Miron estimates that the amount of savings and profits combine could be nearly 12 billion dollars. Between the enforcement that we currently have which is costing us nearly 6 billion and the amount of taxes we could impose could be similar to the tax we have on alcohol to create another 6 billion in profits every year. I think a good relationship to compare this to is alcohol. In other countries there is no drinking age. To us we think that is insane, that everyone would be drunk at young ages and not make responsible decisions. Well when I was in Europe this past year I was curious to see that to the Europeans they don’t really have the same feelings toward alcohol as we do. To them it’s just like being able to drink Gatorade. You do not see kids out of control like you would think. Could marijuana be the same way as alcohol in these other countries, where no one would care to do it as much because it is apart of everyday life.  We will never really know the real answer until it happens. These are all the positives to legalization of marijuana.

                Some negative aspects to the legalization of this drug could be the increase in the amount of people actually doing this drug. One thing that worries me is that obviously marijuana is not healthy for you and that our country could become dysfunctional. People might not work as hard, and the amount of accidents like alcohol related incidences could increase. In all, this is an extremely tough decision that the government needs to think about. You never know because the way our country is struggling economically, that extra cash could be very helpful.  

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