Economically Speaking

According to an article I read in Time the United States spends $68 billion per year on corrections: 1/3 being drug crimes

$150 billion is spent on policing and courts and 47.5% all arrests are marijuana-related.


Opinions aside, that is a heck of a lot of money.

Which brings up the question: would we rather spend money arresting pot heads and take money out of school thanks to the California school budget cut or would we rather regulate the distribution of marijuana and reinstate the budget?

With 14 billion dollars a year in revenue from marijuana, a 10% percent tax would yield 1.4 billion dollars in one year.

The 2009/10 school budget is 2 billion dollars less than the 2008/09. My econ teacher told us in January that the school's budget had been frozen. They were buying toliet paper and paper towels. That was it.

Not even regulating marijuana will save California's school budget...but it's fair to say an extra 1.4 billion dollars is an offer hard to refuse. Economically, California needs marijuana to be regulated.