Earlier quoted context omitted.
Drug sale and use is not victimless. The costs vary with the type of drug and the enforcement regime but the social costs never go to zero. There can be huge negative externalities involved with drug use, as anyone with a family member who has a drug problem could tell you. Even in the most enlightened societies one would have to acknowledge that support and rehabilitation for the small percentage of users who have p…
Alcohol has some of the worst negative externalities of any drug of abuse. It's a causal factor in a huge proportion of road traffic accidents and domestic violence. It kills about 88,000 Americans annually due to overdose, accidents and chronic illness. Typical recreational doses are inherently toxic. When we criminalized alcohol, the negative externalities got worse. Gangsters murdered each other in the street for…
Instead there seems to be two effective strategies, both used for alcohol and tobacco, which is taxation and state monopolies. Taking Sweden as an example, the taxation is made per liter of sold alcohol. The stronger (and assuming bigger effect on society), the more society demand in compensation. Depending on the drink and original price, the tax can actually become several times higher.
Here the money is ear marked for things such as reducing traffic accidents and domestic violence. If the cost are increased you simply increase the tax. Police has a strong incentive to catch this form of tax evasion as part of the money goes to them, and social norms are rather accepting since only poor people are disproportional effected by the price increase.
Similar for state monopoly, the state has a direct incentive to punish would-be completion. From a social perspective, my guess is that people are rather used to monopolies. Each year there is more and more merges leaving fewer companies that actually compete, and naturally prices goes up. Regardless if it is an icecream, a fridge, gass, a phone, a moive, or a news paper, you can best that most products is made by just a handful global companies, or a single one.
And as for the effect, there seems to be a fair correlation to heavy taxation and decrease use. The tax has never been as high in Sweden as now and the use has never been so low.