Kevin Sabet op-ed argues California legalization will cost more than it reaps

Kevin Sabet, a former drug policy advisor for presidents Clinton and Bush, penned the following op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle last week about Assemblyman Tom Ammiano’s bill to legalize pot in California:

It’s a tempting idea: Legalize and tax a commodity that a lot of people like, collect the revenues, and reap the budgetary benefits. In economic times like these, that might be just the formula we need to pull us out of the red. In this case, the truth does not live up to the hype.

Now how many examples of Reefer Madness do you think Dr. Sabet can fit within 600 words of newspaper type?  Read on, dear Stasher, for the answer!

Legalizing marijuana will not solve our budget woes, nor will it be good for public health. Introducing marijuana into the open market is very likely to do some other things, however: increase the drug’s consumption, and with it, the enormous social costs associated with marijuana-related accidents, illness and productivity loss.

Legalization will increase the drug’s consumption?

• “In sum, there is little evidence that decriminalization of marijuana use necessarily leads to a substantial increase in marijuana use.” – National Academy of Sciences, Institute of Medicine (IOM). 1999. Marijuana and Medicine: Assessing the Science Base. National Academy Press: Washington, D.C., 102.

Legalization will increase costs from accidents, illness, and productivity loss?

• Recent research into impairment and traffic accident reports from several countries shows that marijuana taken alone in moderate amounts does not significantly increase a driver’s risk of causing an accident.  (Is there any reason to believe, then, that marijuana taken alone in moderate amounts off-hours away from the work site would increase workplace accidents?  It hasn’t in Oregon, where 1 in 8 people smoke pot annually and we just recorded the lowest workplace accident rates ever in this state.)
• A pair of studies at Utah Power and Light Co. and Georgia Power Co. purporting to show that drug users pose a high risk of accidents and absenteeism only looked at users who had exhibited problem behavior on the job. Not surprisingly, this population had worse than average work records. Nonetheless, Utah Power found that drug users cost $215 less in health insurance benefits, while Georgia Power found lower rates of absenteeism in workers who tested positive only for marijuana!
• Lost productivity studies claiming that drug users cost up to $100 billion each year are based on vague comparisons of household drug use and income, with no analysis of actual productivity data.

The example of legal alcohol and tobacco reveal an unsettling pattern. Legal drugs are by definition easy to obtain, and commercialization glamorizes their use and furthers their social acceptance.

Legalization of alcohol and tobacco show how legalizing cannabis will make it more acceptable?

• The number of U.S. adults who smoke [cigarettes] has dropped below 20 percent for the first time on record.
• Alcohol use among the underaged and those of legal age has declined steadily since 1990.  Conversely, alcohol use rose to record levels during Prohibition.

Their price is low, and high profits make promotion worthwhile for sellers. Addiction is simply the price of doing business. Any revenue gained from taxing these drugs is quickly offset by the heavy costs associated with their increased prevalence.

I’ve debunked this “increased costs” argument in a previous Stash.  Basically, this argument only works if you ignore the fact that any costs attributable to marijuana use are already being absorbed and that just about everyone who wants to use marijuana is already doing so.

Because today’s high-potency marijuana is much more harmful than once thought, a spike in use from legalization would result in a financial burden California cannot afford to bear.

Today’s high potency marijuana is more harmful?

• Claims made in the public domain about a 20- or 30-fold increase in cannabis potency … are not supported currently by the evidence.

It is almost universally accepted in the medical community that marijuana use is linked with mental illness. Since the appearance of the British Medical Journal’s famous 2002 headline, “Marijuana and psychiatric illness: the link grows stronger,” the research showing marijuana’s link with illnesses like psychosis and schizophrenia has become frighteningly commonplace. In fact, researchers from Kings College in London have shown that eliminating marijuana use would decrease the incidence of schizophrenia in the American population by more than 8 percent. That means that marijuana use is responsible for the schizophrenia suffered by more than 19,000 Americans.

Universally accepted that marijuana use is linked with mental illness?

• Investigators reported no statistically significant “differences in syptomatology between schizophrenic patients who were or were not cannabis users” after controlling for patients’ age, sex, and ethnicity. Researchers also failed to find “any evidence that cannabis users with schizophrenia were more likely to have a family member with the disorder.”  These findings “argue against a distinct schizophrenic-like psychosis caused by cannabis,” authors concluded.

Other research has shown the drug’s connection to lung damage, as well as to head, neck and testicular cancers.

Smoking pot will hurt your lungs, head and neck, and testicles?

• Long-term smoking of cannabis is associated with an elevated risk of respiratory complications, including an increase in cough, sputum production, and wheezing, but not a decline in pulmonary function, according to a review published in the February issue of the journal Archives of Internal Medicine.
• Smoking cannabis, even long-term, is not associated with an increased risk of developing cancers of the head or neck, according to the results of a case control population-based study published in the March issue of the journal Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery.
• Men who self-reported having “ever used” marijuana had no statistically significant risk of testicular cancer compared to healthy controls who never used pot.  Men who reported currently using marijuana at least once per week, and who had started smoking pot prior to age 18, had an elevated risk compared to controls of contracting a type of testicular cancer known as nonseminoma.  However, nonseminomas account for fewer than one half of one percent of all cancers among American men and since the 1970s, the percentage of American males smoking pot has climbed dramatically. By contrast, incidences of nonseminoma have risen only nominally during this same time period.

Assemblyman Tom Ammiano’s justification for AB390 relies on the myth that marijuana laws are costing taxpayers millions of dollars and wrecking the lives of otherwise law-abiding citizens.

Marijuana laws don’t cost taxpayers millions of dollars?

• State and local justice costs for marijuana arrests are now estimated to be $7.6 billion, approximately $10,400 per arrest. Of this total, annual police costs are $3.7 billion, judicial/legal costs are $853 million, and correctional costs are $3.1 billion.

But a closer examination of the facts reveals a very different reality. Although there are thousands of arrests for marijuana possession every year in our state, most of these arrests result in little or no consequences. Most of those who are charged with possession plead down from more serious charges, such as trafficking. Researchers from Rand report that many marijuana arrests result from drinking and driving violations at alcohol checkpoints. “The police also find joints, and then (the offender) is in jail for both offenses. People’s images of the casual (marijuana) user getting hauled off to jail are not true,” a Rand researcher recently commented.

Marijuana arrests have little or no consequences?

• If you’re convicted or enter a plea, you’ll be on probation and mandatory Urinalysis Tests will be performed.
• A conviction could impact child custody issues in family court.
• An arrest for Possession with Intent to Distribute or an arrest for the Manufacture of 5 or more plants may result in the State attempting to Forfeit your home, your car, your cash and other assets which they can do even if charges are later dismissed or you are acquitted at trial! This heinous law is know as “Asset Forfeiture”.
• A conviction can impact Federally insured student loans
• A felony conviction deprives you of the right to vote
• A felony conviction deprives you of the right to possess firearms
• A conviction can get you tossed out of government subsidized housing
• A conviction can impair your ability to obtain food stamps and other welfare benefits
• Your ability to ever adopt children will be jeopardized
• You will be denied entry into Canada and possibly other countries
• A misdemeanor conviction remains on your record and available to the public for three years before it can be expunged, which may have an impact on current or future employment
• A felony conviction remains on your record and available to the public for five years before it can be expunged, which may have an impact on current or future employment.

Most marijuana arrests are pleaded down from more serious crimes or concurrent with arrest for other crimes and the casual marijuana users are not hauled off to jail?

• Jack Riley, the Rand study’s lead author, said, “We cannot say, however, whether large numbers of low-level offenders may be in jails, as opposed to prisons.“
• “Although many thousands of offenders receive jail sentences for low-level drug offenses, we examine only prison sentences in this report.“
• Of those imprisoned on low-level drug charges… 68 percent were found to have a previous drug conviction. In addition, 72 percent of those imprisoned on charges of drug use or the possession of drugs or drug paraphernalia had previous drug convictions.  (Read: “three strikes” laws that get you prison time for a joint because you were convicted of two other crimes in your past.)
• Researchers found that more than half of offenders possessed hard drugs, including cocaine and heroin, at the time of their arrests. Just 3 percent of the cases sampled involved marijuana only.  (So, then, there are people in prison for marijuana only, right?  Currently, some 68,500 Americans are either incarcerated or on probation for marijuana violations, the Sentencing Project report determined. Of these, an estimated 11,200 were first time marijuana offenders serving time in state or federal prison.)

Rand-sponsored research reveals that in the Netherlands, where the drug is sold openly at “coffee shops,” marijuana use among young adults increased almost 300 percent after a wave of commercialization. The country has also become a haven for producers of high-potency marijuana, and other drugs like ecstasy and methamphetamine. These unintended consequences have led many Dutch officials to advocate for rolling back the status quo.

Once the Netherlands began tolerating marijuana sales, use increased dramatically?

• Amsterdam, the Netherlands: Liberalizing marijuana laws is not associated with increased cannabis use among the general public, according to a scientific review published this month in the journal Current Opinion in Psychiatry.  (Use of marijuana did increase in Holland… as it did everywhere in Europe around the same time as the coffee shops came into existence.  Still, the Netherlands has half the drug use rates as the United States.)

To be sure, restricting marijuana use by law – especially because some people find it extremely pleasurable – is not without its costs. But legalizing this addictive substance would only exacerbate our problems by increasing the harm that greater levels of use will cause. Given the heavy costs associated with our two legal substances, and the relatively minor costs associated with our current restrictive marijuana policy, the case for a commercial market for marijuana remains weak and unconvincing – even in this uncomfortable economic environment.

It seems like the argument for a commercial California marijuana market is convincing at least six out of ten people who hear it.

By my count that’s seventeen examples of Reefer Madness packed into 598 words, for a score of 2.84 Anslingers (an Anslinger is my newly-coined measurement of Reefer Madness, indicating the average number of reefer mad propositions offered per 100 words.  So far, 2.84 is the upper benchmark… but I’m sure Barbara Kay or Calvina Fay or John Walters will top it sometime soon.