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SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

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Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#211

Post by pengaru »

boringg wrote: post #194
pengaru wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Judging from news reports, a good chunk is grown in the desert region as well: https://z1077fm.com/tag/marijuana/

Seems like both mexican and asian gangs based on those arrested. Desert seems like a bold place to grow even in the shade structures... All you need to do is run an algorithm over the satellite data for any new structures on a weekly basis then have PD check it out for illegal grow op...

The consequences for the perps are basically nil, it's apparently a land use violation as far as CA is concerned. Literally a county code enforcement/permitting office problem of agriculture in a non-agriculture zone. At least until they find illegal weapons or evidence of other crimes.

There's been rumblings of changing the laws to increase the penalties, but I haven't followed the issue closely. The large grows are problematic for the region's water security/quality, since the region is dependent on finite groundwater aquifers full of ancient water that isn't being recharged anywhere near the rate of consumption AIUI. There are reasons it's not zoned for agriculture.

Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#212

Post by Redoubts »

hoten wrote: post #173
MisterTea wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For a daily or heavy smoker, a ~50% discount is a massive amount of money. Its more than that. I have a few dispensarys in CA and the experience is shit. The places are loaded with cash because they cant legally accept credit or debit cards. So you have to bring cash or use their ATM and get charged a withdrawal fee. This also means they are targets for robbery so security at these places is crazy with guards, wait…

Kind of an aside, but there are banks that reimburse withdrawal fees. Schwab is one.

Many credit unions will do this too. (They don’t charge foreign atm fee, and reimburse for the atm’s fee)

Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#213

Post by unethical_ban »

MisterTea wrote: post #149
bryans wrote: post #24

In most recreational states, cannabis is taxed heavily at every step in the supply chain, so the highest quality still ends up being very expensive -- upward of $400/oz. The black market has the exact same quality at the wholesale price, typically 40-60% less than retail, with the added bonus of not having the government involved. For a daily or heavy smoker, a ~50% discount is a massive amount of money.

> For a daily or heavy smoker, a ~50% discount is a massive amount of money. Its more than that. I have a few dispensarys in CA and the experience is shit. The places are loaded with cash because they cant legally accept credit or debit cards. So you have to bring cash or use their ATM and get charged a withdrawal fee. This also means they are targets for robbery so security at these places is crazy with guards, wait…

As a Texan who has perused dispensaries in CO, OR and CA, I have never had such an unpleasant experience. In fact, the largest and most professional feeling dispensary was in SoCal. It felt like an apple store. There was no anteroom, and products were displayed in arrayed glass cases and hanging in walls.

Several places I have been to have a small waiting area that you must be let to pass, but that is more common in my experience in smaller towns.

I can't comment on the prices, since I have never bought bud illegally. But the in-store experiences have been just fine, and I don't have to hang out at a bar and try not to look like a cop to find a stranger selling.

Edit, the CA experience was 2-3 years ago, so maybe things have gotten worse or maybe in places where rule of law is less enforced, things have changed.

Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#214

Post by ironmagma »

sneak wrote: post #210
ironmagma wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people who supported it said it was to get away from the deliberate imprisonment of black people who didn’t deserve criminal penalties for casual drug use. So I guess the question is, which is the worse conspiracy?

The USA has a long history of taking any industry in which black people are amassing wealth, power, or status, and stealing or destroying it. You can't maintain an intelligent, hard-working group as an underclass for multiple generations without deliberate action and sabotage each and every time advances are made. It's nothing new, just the latest installment. See also: music (jazz, rock, rap, techno, motown), Tulsa,…

This observation still provides no solution to the catch-22 of imprisoning black people vs taking away money from black people. It seems almost like black people are just people, so deciding policies are going to be good for some and bad for others, just like every policy.

Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#215

Post by golergka »

MisterTea wrote: post #207
golergka wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's wild hearing that in other countries drug dealers still accept cash and meet people in person. Although prices for practically everything are way higher here (10g would cost you about 200$ or more), the convenience of using bitcoin and not having to meet a single soul to make a purchase at any hour of the day still outweighs it for me.

> not having to meet a single soul Then how do you get your weed? Teleporter?

Deaddrop. You get an address, sometimes a GPS spot, a couple of photos, and retrieve whatever substance you ordered yourself.

Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#216

Post by fragmede »

specialist wrote: post #146

Yes and (Adjacently): Dispensaries also need access to basic financial services. Like merchant bank accounts. In my jurisdiction, dispensaries are still cash only. Because of federal law, banks won't touch weed money. (Ironic, given how many have laundered cartel monies.) IIRC, there's been security problems. Like stick-up robberies. Which increases risks and costs (more security). I know people working on weed polic…

Of the lesser known things that San Francisco has done in this sphere, is that the SF Office Of Cannabis gave those that were materially oppressed by the War on Drugs [1], a leg up on starting cannabis-related businesses. They gave them a year's head start a few years ago before licensing was available to all, and now there's a government-run incubator.

[1] https://officeofcannabis.sfgov.org/equity/applicant#equity-c...

Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#217

Post by nate_meurer »

ramraj07 wrote: post #77
thaumasiotes wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Legalization was sold to politicians with the promise of high taxes. We knew that poor users would be priced out of the market, that legal weed would be a privilege enjoyed by the rich Poor users seem to enjoy a lot of legal alcohol. Taxes on that are high too, and it's even easier to make your own alcohol than to make your own weed.

Sure, you can make alcohol yourself. Then you discover some batteries increase the kick. Then you realize a drop of methanol just takes it to insane levels. Then 2 drops kill or blind you.

"Two drops" of even pure methanol won't do anything to you. Not even close.

Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#218

Post by fragmede »

gumby wrote: post #204
specialist wrote: post #146

Yes and (Adjacently): Dispensaries also need access to basic financial services. Like merchant bank accounts. In my jurisdiction, dispensaries are still cash only. Because of federal law, banks won't touch weed money. (Ironic, given how many have laundered cartel monies.) IIRC, there's been security problems. Like stick-up robberies. Which increases risks and costs (more security). I know people working on weed polic…

I had a business plan to fix this but it was hard to get it funded, even by the heavy investors in the legal pot business, because of fear of the feds. It’s a shame because it broke no banking laws according to my lawyers, but of course the feds can lean on the big funds. The short answer was to do all the banking in Canadian dollars where it’s entirely legal. Independent of pot, Canadian banking laws are set up for…

I'd be fascinated to hear more about how your CAD idea wasn't going to contravene any US laws while giving the cannabis industry access to the banking industry.

If you're exclusively in Canada then the US Feds are nowhere near as much of a concern, but then that also doesn't get you any access to the US market, which seems to be the point. Let's say the legal pot industry on near the northern US border switched over to Canadian dollars to get this system to work, it still seems you'd need to get Canadian dollars to Canadian banks (because they can't be deposited at US bank accounts because the issue is that pot businesses can't make deposits to US bank accounts, not the nature of the cash being used.)

Buuuut... aren't there rules about moving more than $10k (USD) cash, or equivalent financial instruments (aka CAD) across the border?

Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#219

Post by dumbfoundded »

sokoloff wrote: post #114
dumbfoundded wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just the taxes. It's how hard it is to sell weed legally. All of the hoops and expenses add up. In Florida, it's like 20 licenses that cost $25M each. We should make it as easy as selling alcohol and then the prices will match.

Is your claim that it costs half a billion dollars to setup to sell weed legally in FL? That defies all order-of-magnitude estimation.

No, $25M is the open market price for a license charges a company to pick up a license. Looks like someone sold a license for much more (0). Only 22 licenses for companies in Florida have been granted (1). In Florida, companies have to vertically integrate their whole supplychain and not mix with any other cannabis company. It takes opening like 50 dispensaries under a license to break even. Florida sells $1.2B of cannabis a year & $500M in acquisitions were completed in Florida last year.

(0) https://www.tampabay.com/florida-politics/buzz/2019/10/15/fo...

(1) https://mjbizdaily.com/florida-medical-marijuana-operators-b...

(2) https://mjbizdaily.com/cannabis-msos-on-buying-spree-in-flor....

Re: SF suspends cannabis tax to help dispensaries compete with drug dealers

#220

Post by MisterTea »

golergka wrote: post #215
MisterTea wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> not having to meet a single soul Then how do you get your weed? Teleporter?

Deaddrop. You get an address, sometimes a GPS spot, a couple of photos, and retrieve whatever substance you ordered yourself.

yeesh. That sounds awful. The reason why I get curb side are:

1. If he doesn't have your number in his phone ahead of time, he wont respond. I had to be recommended by a close friend of his who is in turn good friends with me. He has to trust you and any deviations from basic rules will get you banned (he ghosts you).

2. He doesn't deliver himself, he has 2-4 drivers he pays well ($400/day + all the weed you can smoke)

3. Most people in my neighborhood know how to mind their damn business or smoke too so no one gives a shit.

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