One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry • Hacker News Board

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#21

Post by brianwawok » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 8:45 PM UTC

0x4d464d48 wrote: post #18

Maybe this article overstated things and someone will clear it up in the comments but that was painful to read. I live in Vancouver and weed's been officially legal throughout the Canada for several weeks now. It's still relatively new but nothing noticeable has changed aside from fewer people discussing such a frivilous and previously mishandled issue. It's not perfect but far, far, far better than strict prohibitio…

> What bothers me the most about this story is how marijuana is supposedly 'legal' yet some locals seem Hell-bent on treating it like an illegal and necessarily dangerous.

It is still illegal at the federal level. There is nothing that stops the federal US government from throwing someone in jail for growing / transporting / using / processing payment for marijuana.

I cannot think of anything else that is illegal at the federal but legal at the state level, and has weird hand wavy aspects in front of it.

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#22

Post by bigfartchili » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 8:45 PM UTC

jngreenlee wrote: post #15

KingMachiavelli wrote: post #11

For perspective Colorado has 549 retail establishments and 574 medical establishments (although many overlap) while having ~3/20 the population of California. While obviously Colorado has had retail cannabis since 2012/13, both states have areas strongly for and strongly against legalization. Considering that the cities that do allow rec cannabis include Los Angeles, Oakland, San Francisco and San Diego, the number o…

Reporter from CO here. I think this is the crux of the matter. If the points about a strong underground market in the article are true, it's (IMO) due to a weakened attempt at decriminalization. Very much like bittorrents before netflix/prime were widely available with large catalogs. Here in Sunny CO, the prop was a Constitutional Amendment , guaranteeing the right of each state citizen to grow and possess their own…

There are a lot more cities than Colorado Springs that don’t allow retail including many of the surrounding Denver cities.

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#23

Post by cbanek » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 8:47 PM UTC

The other factor not talked about is that in general the prices seem to be going down due to a lot of supply (both on the retail/licensed market, and the grey/black market). About ten years ago, a really good pound (in bulk) could go for $3k-$4k to a dispensary. Now the high end seems to have fallen out and you're maybe lucky to get half of that. I think a lot of people ran their business plan numbers where they were, but now that there's a lot more supply, just the raw numbers are going down. There's also a lot more low quality product on the market, which pushes down prices on higher quality things slowly. And yes, the licensing, taxes, and testing are just insult to injury on top of that.

Overall I think it's a good thing though. Since real medical patients never get their pot on medical insurance, the reduction in cost really helps consumers.

Source: anecdotal data from friends that were in the industry, and prices at Harborside back in "the day."

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#24

Post by simplecomplex » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 8:53 PM UTC

Marijuana policy is the epitome of broken American politics. Obsession with money and morality, racism and ignorance driving policy, a tiny minority out-of-touch with what they’re regulating writing the legislation, business regulations that are designed for business not people, and on and on.

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#25

Post by BenjiWiebe » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 8:55 PM UTC

brianwawok wrote: post #21

0x4d464d48 wrote: post #18

Maybe this article overstated things and someone will clear it up in the comments but that was painful to read. I live in Vancouver and weed's been officially legal throughout the Canada for several weeks now. It's still relatively new but nothing noticeable has changed aside from fewer people discussing such a frivilous and previously mishandled issue. It's not perfect but far, far, far better than strict prohibitio…

> What bothers me the most about this story is how marijuana is supposedly 'legal' yet some locals seem Hell-bent on treating it like an illegal and necessarily dangerous. It is still illegal at the federal level. There is nothing that stops the federal US government from throwing someone in jail for growing / transporting / using / processing payment for marijuana. I cannot think of anything else that is illegal at…

Just pointing out that the GP is referring to Canada, not the US.

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#26

Post by Nasrudith » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 8:56 PM UTC

nine_k wrote: post #10

aphextron wrote: post #4

It all comes down to local control of licensing. To even operate a 100% mobile business, you have to be licensed out of a specific city. This involves all the associated cronyism, NIMBYism, and the like which goes along with local politics, and grinds the whole system to a halt. We need to adopt a statewide system like Oregon or there will be no room for smaller distributors left and we will be stuck with monopolized…

Some may see high monopolized prices and having to jump through hoops as "fair": that is, cannabis use is not "good" and thus should not be made easy or cheap. See alcohol and tobacco. IDK if this mindset is widespread enough in California. But coincidentally such an approach does improve the bottom line of large / established sellers.

Ah the classic baptists and bootleggers connection - making things worse for everyone except them.

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#27

Post by trhway » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 8:57 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #17

aphextron wrote: post #4

It all comes down to local control of licensing. To even operate a 100% mobile business, you have to be licensed out of a specific city. This involves all the associated cronyism, NIMBYism, and the like which goes along with local politics, and grinds the whole system to a halt. We need to adopt a statewide system like Oregon or there will be no room for smaller distributors left and we will be stuck with monopolized…

I'm personally fine with local control, and despite the negative tone of this article, it all sounds pretty normal to me. I live in SF, where there are a variety of shops. The ones I walk by all seem clean, orderly, and well run. Certainly more so than some liquor stores I can think of. So I'm happy to have them as neighbors. That said, I understand why other cities would have been more reluctant to license. Not ever…

[IANAL] if my city and all the others around prohibit such stores it is de-facto equivalent to Prohibition in that area while the state level amendment granted that right to all the people in the state, and no local government has the power to exclude it own particular local area from the amendment.

The same principle as with for example right to vote with no voting place in N (for sufficiently large N) miles radius.

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#28

Post by newnewpdro » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 9:00 PM UTC

My personal issue with how legal pot has played out is I have no interest in becoming a patron of these lifestyle shops for a variety of reasons.

I also don't want my ID to be scanned for buying something still federally illegal.

If I could occasionally buy marijuana products at the grocery store as part of my normal shopping, no different than my occasional purchase of whiskey or wine, then I would have at least bought legal weed a few times since it was legalized here in CA. Even if it were relatively expensive.

Instead, today I'm far more likely to either not acquire any marijuana products at all (it's been years already) or buy some from the guy on the street who might also have shrooms.

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#29

Post by 0x4d464d48 » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 9:04 PM UTC

jaggederest wrote: post #20

0x4d464d48 wrote: post #18

Maybe this article overstated things and someone will clear it up in the comments but that was painful to read. I live in Vancouver and weed's been officially legal throughout the Canada for several weeks now. It's still relatively new but nothing noticeable has changed aside from fewer people discussing such a frivilous and previously mishandled issue. It's not perfect but far, far, far better than strict prohibitio…

A lot of the concern is essentially about the precedent it sets. If you start questioning the logic of criminalizing cannabis, what's next on the list? That's the fear driving a lot of the reactionary opposition to a lot of things these days, and I think especially in the tech industry we have to remember that a lot of people don't have our appetite for risk. Personally I think we as a society have demonstrated a con…

"A lot of the concern is essentially about the precedent it sets. If you start questioning the logic of criminalizing cannabis, what's next on the list?"

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

It's ironic that for so many Americans the idea that people should be allowed to make their own choices would be such a tough sell...

Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry

#30

Post by noobiemcfoob » Thu, Dec 27, 2018, 9:05 PM UTC

bcOpus wrote: post #14

nine_k wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some may see high monopolized prices and having to jump through hoops as "fair": that is, cannabis use is not "good" and thus should not be made easy or cheap. See alcohol and tobacco. IDK if this mindset is widespread enough in California. But coincidentally such an approach does improve the bottom line of large / established sellers.

Then those people are actively seeking to maintain the supremacy of the black market, despite decades of evidence as to the inability of such measures to reduce consumption. Maybe people who have such ignorant and baseless beliefs shouldn’t be heeded.

Yeah, but they don't and won't see it that way. The people with these types of reactions seem to think things go away when you make them illegal (probably aided by them having never actually seen the problem firsthand anyway).

You can choose to heed their views or not, but they still get to vote the same as you.