Tuesday, February 20, 2018

Legal Pot Sellers Hate the Black Market

LA Times:
Six weeks after the state began licensing marijuana farming and sales, officials have received a flood of complaints about illegal pot operations and demands for a start to tough enforcement.

Many of the 304 complaints received in recent weeks are from newly licensed businesses that say they are being harmed financially by the continuing illegal market. . . .

"We really need enforcement in California given that the local licensees are really having to fight against the black market," Stephanie Hopper, a representative of the firm Canndescent, which grows and sells marijuana in California, told the panel.
So much for saving a lot of money in policing.

1 comment:

G. Verloren said...

Obviously there will be an initial cost, to get rid of the black market and its impacts. If you're going to make people pay money to have a license, they're going to be unable to compete with people who DON'T have to pay for a license.

But rooting out the black market is a one time cost. Once people stop using the black market and adapt to using legal sources, it won't be worth anyone's time to try to revive the black market as a seller, and it won't be worth anyone's time to seek out the black market as a buyer. Once legal sales are the norm, you don't have to pay for policing anymore, because no one will bother going through all the trouble for illegal goods. Money will absolutely be saved on policing in the long run - you just need to get the ball rolling first.