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Marijuana tax take nearly double expected in Colorado

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Re: Marijuana tax take nearly double expected in Colorado

#121

Post by diyorgasms »

gregpilling wrote: post #105
fpgaminer wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but we didn't earmarking marijuana taxes for education so that we could improve education. Any informed voter would know that. We did it so that we could get uninformed/uneducated voters to pass the legislation. Now, I don't mean "uninformed/uneducated voters" in a negative way. Most voters, even intelligent ones, are classed as uninformed/uneducated when it comes to most topics. Because really, who has time du…

I am in Arizona, one of the least funded states in terms of education. Your statement " accept donations from their teachers and parents," is slightly off here. In Arizona they DEMAND money. My free public school education came with a 'recommended' $1500 per year, per kid. They do accept payments however. It is not mandatory, your kid is not expelled if you don't pay. But the school does very clearly say "this charte…

A charter school is not a public school. It exists outside of this system you are talking about, and has a whole host of other problems. But it is disingenuous to bring a charter school into this discussion, because they are not the same thing as publicly funded public schools.

Re: Marijuana tax take nearly double expected in Colorado

#122

Post by chimeracoder »

justinator wrote: post #115
Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would think that your anecdotal evidence wouldn't map to the actual circumstances very well. A strong majority of marijuana users in Colorado are recreational, and they can give it up without any physical consequences like you would face if they had to deal with difficult financial times.

According to [0], $326,716,273.59 sales were made for medical marijuana, $246,810,599.03 sales were made for recreational marijuana. Recreational marijuana is also a little less than 30% more expensive. [1] I guess that means that more pot is being sold with a medicinal marijuana card than recreational. Or, did you have other numbers? [0] http://www.thecannabist.co/2014/12/26/pot-sales-taxes-statis... [1] https://www…

Medical marijuana is not subject to any special taxes (aside from normal sales tax on all goods, which is 2.9% across the state + any local sales tax). That amounts to less than $10MM, and it dosn't count towards the tax revenues from Amendment 64, which was the constitutional amendment that legalized recreational marijuana.

It's also worth mentioning that because it is relatively easy to access a medical marijuana card in Colorado, heavy recreational users have an incentive to get a medical card.

Re: Marijuana tax take nearly double expected in Colorado

#123

Post by jlarocco »

justinator wrote: post #115
Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would think that your anecdotal evidence wouldn't map to the actual circumstances very well. A strong majority of marijuana users in Colorado are recreational, and they can give it up without any physical consequences like you would face if they had to deal with difficult financial times.

According to [0], $326,716,273.59 sales were made for medical marijuana, $246,810,599.03 sales were made for recreational marijuana. Recreational marijuana is also a little less than 30% more expensive. [1] I guess that means that more pot is being sold with a medicinal marijuana card than recreational. Or, did you have other numbers? [0] http://www.thecannabist.co/2014/12/26/pot-sales-taxes-statis... [1] https://www…

The line between medical and recreational is (or at least was) very fuzzy, though.

Before recreational was legal there were a lot of more or less healthy people getting licenses for silly symptoms, like nausea or difficulty sleeping. There was a very low burden or proof and it was pretty well known that a lot of people were making up problems just to get the license.

I don't know of anybody actually doing it, but it's entirely possible that a lot of the not-so-serious medicinal users are now just keeping the license for price discounts and better availability. It'll be interesting to see those numbers in a few years as the licenses need to be renewed.

Re: Marijuana tax take nearly double expected in Colorado

#124

Post by chipgap98 »

moonchrome wrote: post #91
chipgap98 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that a reasonable metric in this case? I'd be more interested in the tax other countries have on marijuana/alcohol

Considering those get taxed on top of VAT and are even higher in my country (it's not a % tax but a fixed number per defined unit but it comes down to ~30% post VAT on tobacco products for eg.) and AFAIK US has no VAT (maybe I'm wrong ?) I wouldn't call 25% tax incredibly high.

In the US, that would be an incredibly high tax

Re: Marijuana tax take nearly double expected in Colorado

#125

Post by toomuchtodo »

TallGuyShort wrote: post #89
toomuchtodo wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like their alcohol taxes are far too low, considering how much more harmful alcohol is versus marijuana.

I've had a hard time convincing many of fellow Coloradoans of how harmful alcohol is compared to marijuana. It's newly legal, so people fear it more irrationally.

This is what I use to get my point across.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2010/11/drugs_caus...

Re: Marijuana tax take nearly double expected in Colorado

#126

Post by rancur »

jschwartzi wrote: post #114
rancur wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The schools continue to underpay teachers they always build brand new multi million dollar schools with fantastic football fields

In my state, these kinds of expenditures are funded through district bonds which are a one-shot property tax increase for a set period of time, whereas teacher salaries and other yearly expenditures are funded through levies which have to be periodically increased to keep pace. Additionally, whenever we pass referenda to bump the base pay for educators, the state legislature is very very quick to turn them into unfun…

interesting....
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