One of the most hilariously stupid arguments against legalisation of drugs is that it makes everyone into a junkie.
Fact is most people don't do drugs, even if you can buy it in the supermarket.
One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
81–90 of 170 posts
Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
#82Miraculously over-regulation causes supply shortages. I'm surprised this is even news.
Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
> 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…
"There is nothing that stops the federal US government from throwing someone in jail for growing / transporting / using / processing payment for marijuana." I always wondered about that. Has there been any chatter about someone trying to get a federal court to nullify the law? I have no idea how that can work.
> Has there been any chatter about someone trying to get a federal court to nullify the law? I have no idea how that can work.
The US has signed up to a treaty that requires us to treat marijuana as an illegal controlled substance. That requires an explicit act of Congress to abrogate, and no court is going to find otherwise.
Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
Some people don't want a shop next to them. The stench is horrid, and the kind of people that loiter around them are the last people you want near your house. Legalizing a stupid and shitty practice because society doesn't want to enforce it doesn't make it any less stupid or shitty.
The shops don't create horrid stenches. The grow ops and processing facilities do create noxious odors, but the stores hardly produce an odor that can be smelled from the street, or even in the stores. What kind of people do you suppose loiter at these shops? From my experiences here in CO, no one loiters at these shops. The stores often have pretty tight security and attentive guards. You go in, do your business, an…
When I lived in Denver I recall being far more worried about the characters outside the liquor store than the weed stores.
Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
#85> Retailers and growers say they’ve been stunted by complex regulations, high taxes I can't say I'm surprised. As someone who grew up on the Oregon border of California on i5, locals here complain about California's influence on the local economy and politics. (E.g. buying expensive land, driving taxes up) However in Oregon, I believe our problem is with oversaturation of the market. From what I understand (not rehea…
> it's not unheard of for places to sell quality marijuana for as low as $48/ounce, which is very cheap When I look at other dried herbs on amazon, they're much cheaper. E.g. thyme is about $10 for 12 ounces, oregano is $13 for 5 ounces. Weed obviously has higher taxes, more regulation and I presume a smaller market (most people consume culinary herbs as part of their diet, not everybody consumes weed). But I'd expec…
First off, marijuana is a flower, not an herb.
Second off, much work goes into developing and stabilising a strain.
Thirdly, high quality MJ is grown indoors, with artificial lighting.
Fourthly, it requires a curing process.
Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
#86Maybe 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…
Almost all the storefronts have closed in Vancouver since "legalization", that's the big change I noticed.
Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
#87Another big issue might be the financial industry. Marijuana is still illegal at the Federal level so banks might be reticent to get involved with providing loans or services to these businesses. Without access to credit and banking services, a lot of people who might otherwise go into business, won't.
A former coworker's brother-in-law ran into this. He was a finance officer and got laid-off back during the Great Recession. He found a position as the CFO of a dispensary, and one of the first problems he had to address was employees doing cash pickups from the stores using their personal cars. So there were people moving $20k+ daily in their Toyotas (not especially safe!)
So he called some of the armored car firms to inquire about hiring them, and they all turned him down flat because they didn't want the chance of his cash getting intermingled with that of Wells Fargo, etc. What he did was set up a wholly-owned subsidiary to do the transport, buying a couple of armored cars to move both the money and the product.
Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
[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.
Yeah ultimately you're being stripped of your state given rights by a locality run by cronies where it takes millions jus to win a seat on the local board of supervisors. Even though we do have ballot initiatives, a non-democratic, corrupt local process can ultimately strip you basically of all your rights. This also impacts criminalizing poverty by local governments where basically being low income and being there i…
> stripped of your state given rights
That seems like a strong way to put it... How about "stripped of opportunities not taken away by the state"?
California didn't give anyone a "right" to buy/use weed, they just said they wouldn't stop you. Notably, it's still illegal at the federal level...
Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
[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.
Yeah ultimately you're being stripped of your state given rights by a locality run by cronies where it takes millions jus to win a seat on the local board of supervisors. Even though we do have ballot initiatives, a non-democratic, corrupt local process can ultimately strip you basically of all your rights. This also impacts criminalizing poverty by local governments where basically being low income and being there i…
The City of San Diego is the second largest city in California and the eight largest in the United States. For the latest election cycle the City Council fundraising was in the low $100,000 — hardly “millions.”
I think the total across all races in the entire county (school boards, ballot measures, multiple city councils, water districts, everything) was about $33 million for all candidates. SD County is so big that if it were a state it would be about 20th.
See for example — https://www.kpbs.org/news/2018/aug/10/latest-fundraising-num...
Re: One year into legal pot sales California doesn’t have expected bustling industry
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it's not unheard of for places to sell quality marijuana for as low as $48/ounce, which is very cheap When I look at other dried herbs on amazon, they're much cheaper. E.g. thyme is about $10 for 12 ounces, oregano is $13 for 5 ounces. Weed obviously has higher taxes, more regulation and I presume a smaller market (most people consume culinary herbs as part of their diet, not everybody consumes weed). But I'd expec…
First off, marijuana is a flower, not an herb. Second off, much work goes into developing and stabilising a strain. Thirdly, high quality MJ is grown indoors, with artificial lighting. Fourthly, it requires a curing process.
To clarify a few hort points : flowers are part of the herb and are treated / sold as herbs in the herb trade. A few common examples : Chamomile, Calendula, rose [R. gallica]
Generally, all herbs require curing [e.g., fan-driven air drying at a specific temperature] if not sold fresh; in addition, the work of developing a cultivar or strain is similar for a great many trade herbs that are farmed as opposed to gathered in the wild [e.g., the numerous types of basil, F1 hybrids of parsley, valerian cultivars of varying potency, etc etc]