“It has been more than two years since New York notionally legalized recreational marijuana, and things are not going quite as planned. “Although Gov. Kathy Hochul suggested last fall that more than 100 dispensaries would be operating by this summer,” The New York Times notes, “just 12 have opened since regulators issued the first licenses in November.”
Part of the problem, as you might expect, is red tape and bureaucratic ineptitude. But another barrier to letting licensed marijuana merchants compete with the unauthorized vendors who have conspicuously proliferated since the spring of 2021 is the state’s affirmative action program for victims of pot prohibition.
New York, like several other states that have legalized marijuana, mandated preferences for license applicants who suffered as a result of the crusade against cannabis. While that idea has a pleasing symmetry, it never made much sense as a way of making up for the harm inflicted by cannabis criminalization. And in practice, executing the plan has drastically limited the legal marijuana supply, making it much harder to achieve the state’s avowed goal of displacing the black market.
To be clear: I don’t think people with marijuana convictions should be excluded from participating in the newly legal market, a policy that would add insult to injury. But that does not mean they should have a legal advantage over cannabis entrepreneurs who were never arrested but might be better qualified.”
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“New York reserved the first batch of up to 175 retail licenses mainly for people with marijuana-related criminal records or their relatives. Those applicants needed to show they had experience running a “profitable” legal business in the state. Nonprofit organizations with “a history of serving current or formerly incarcerated individuals” also were eligible, provided they had “at least five full time employees,” “at least one justice involved board member,” and a track record of operating “a social enterprise that had net assets or profit for at least two years.” Another requirement was demonstrating “a significant presence in New York State,” which led to litigation and a temporary injunction against issuing retail licenses in five areas of the state.
Satisfying the state’s criteria required “a lot of documentation,” Bloomberg CityLab reporter Amelia Pollard noted last fall, which gave New York’s Office of Cannabis Management (OCM) “a mound of paperwork to wade through.” As of November, the OCM had received more than 900 applications from would-be marijuana retailers. On November 20, it announced that it had granted 36 “provisional conditional adult-use retail dispensary licenses” to individuals and organizations.”
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“The approved retailers are far outnumbered by unauthorized vendors, many of whom openly sell marijuana from storefronts, trucks, and tables, unencumbered by the state’s licensing requirements, regulations, and taxes. Yelp’s list of the “best recreational marijuana dispensaries” in New York City includes 90 outlets, only a few of which are blessed by the OCM.”
“Legalization linked to fewer suicides, traffic fatalities, and opioid deaths. A new paper on the public health effects of legalizing marijuana finds “little credible evidence to suggest that [medical marijuana] legalization promotes marijuana use among teenagers” and “convincing evidence that young adults consume less alcohol when medical marijuana is legalized.””
“Bianca Clayborne and Deonte Williams were driving through rural Tennessee with their five young children when they were pulled over. When police found 5 grams of marijuana in the car, Williams was arrested and the five children were seized by local child protective services. One month later, the couple is still fighting to regain custody of their children.”
“Despite the Chinese Communist Party’s strict stance on drugs, the triads — which run global crime networks distributing chemicals needed to manufacture methamphetamine and fentanyl, among other potentially dangerous substances — often curry favor with the CCP by functioning as extralegal enforcers for the government, Felbab-Brown said. The CCP in turn often allows them to continue their operations, though it does not control them.”
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“Roughly 75 percent of the $100 billion cannabis market in the U.S. remains illegal, and roughly two thirds of that illicit weed is grown domestically”
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“In California, the Department of Cannabis Control says Chinese triads have been nominally involved in illegal cannabis production for decades, but that there’s been a recent increase in the number of actors and money that may have originated in China. The DCC also said that some — but not all — of the Chinese-funded grows they’ve encountered are operated by Chinese triads.”
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““This notion that you now have Chinese actual funding for illicit cannabis, it’s definitely new, and it cuts directly across the interests of Mexican drug trafficking groups,” said Felbab-Brown. “It’s interesting to see whether it continues growing, [and] how that’s going to affect relations between the Mexicans and the Chinese [criminal groups].””
“President Joe Biden, who recently issued a mass pardon for low-level marijuana offenders, says cannabis consumption should not be treated as a crime. His administration nevertheless defends the federal ban on gun possession by marijuana users, arguing that Second Amendment rights are limited to “law-abiding citizens.”
Last week, a federal judge agreed, dismissing a challenge to that rule by medical marijuana patients in Florida. The reasoning underlying that decision shows that the constitutional right to armed self-defense, which the Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld, is still subject to legislators’ arbitrary whims and irrational prejudices.”
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“Winsor noted a long history of banning gun ownership by people convicted of certain crimes. But as Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett pointed out in a 2019 dissent as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, that history does not suggest that any crime, or even any felony, will do.
“Legislatures have the power to prohibit dangerous people from possessing guns,” Barrett wrote. “But that power extends only to people who are dangerous.”
Are cannabis consumers dangerous? Winsor suggested that they are, accepting the Biden administration’s analogy between the gun ban for marijuana users and laws enacted in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries that prohibited people from either carrying or firing guns “while intoxicated.”
That analogy fails, however, because those laws did not impose general bans on gun possession by drinkers. They applied only when gun owners were under the influence.”
“Voters on Tuesday approved the legalization of recreational marijuana in Maryland and Missouri while rejecting similar measures in Arkansas, North Dakota, and South Dakota. Meanwhile, voters in five Texas cities passed ballot measures that bar local police from issuing citations or making arrests for low-level marijuana possession. But the most striking election result for drug policy reformers looking beyond the ongoing collapse of marijuana prohibition happened in Colorado, where a broad psychedelic decriminalization measure is winning by two points with 80 percent of votes counted.
Prior to yesterday’s elections, 37 states had approved marijuana for medical purposes, and 19 of them also had legalized recreational use. The Maryland and Missouri results raise the latter number to 21.”
“When California legalized recreational marijuana in 2016, the state had more than 3,000 weed shops. They ostensibly served the medical market, but the rules were so loose that pretty much anyone who wanted pot could buy it legally. Six years later, California had less than half as many licensed marijuana merchants, accounting for between a quarter and a third of total sales.
Something clearly has gone wrong “when you try to legalize weed and accidentally end up illegalizing it instead,” note University of California, Davis, economists Robin Goldstein and Daniel Sumner. In their book Can Legal Weed Win?, they explain how burdensome licensing requirements, regulations, and taxes have frustrated plans to displace the black market.”
“They looked at the effects of cannabis use in both adults and teenagers, using study participants who said they used marijuana at least once per week over the previous three months. Average use among study participants was four days per week, with some participants saying they used marijuana every day. Participants in the control group were matched for age and gender.
The major takeaway: Cannabis users were no more likely than non-users to be apathetic or anhedonic (that is, to experience a loss of interest or pleasure). Nor were more frequent cannabis users likely to be more apathetic or anhedonic than their counterparts who partook less frequently.
The researchers came to this conclusion by first having participants answer questions about their emotions and interests (for instance, rating statements such as “I would enjoy being with family or close friends” or how interested they are in learning new things). Cannabis users scored similarly to non-users on measures of apathy and motivation, and scored lower than non-users on measures of anhedonia.
Around half of participants were also asked to complete some simple tasks, with a promise of small rewards (chocolates and other sweets) for completing these tasks. Participants could accept or reject the offers, and would get points toward rewards if the task was completed. Participants were also asked to rate who much they wanted several rewards—a £1 coin, a piece of candy, or listening to part of one of their favorite songs—and asked after receiving the reward how pleasurable they found it.
“We were surprised to see that there was really very little difference between cannabis users and non-users when it came to lack of motivation or lack of enjoyment, even among those who used cannabis every day,” said Skumlien. “This is contrary to the stereotypical portrayal we see on TV and in movies.””