The War On Drugs
The Legalization of marijuana may single handedly end the war on drugs which has taken up trillions of tax payers dollars and has taken decades to fight. In a statistic provided by the Washington post, it is visible that the amount of marijuana seised at the Mexican boarder has been cut down by more then 50% between 2010 to 2015 at 1.5 million pounds(The Washington Post). This drastic drop has nothing to do with the efficiency of boarder patrol or the effectiveness of the DEA, but has everything to do with the fact that people can now get legal domestically grown marijuana from dispensaries for a fraction of the price with an exponentially greater quality. By legalizing Marijuana the drug cartels especially those in south America that have become notorious for illegal trafficking marijuana into the United States have begun to fall down due to the recent growth in marijuana supply and the demand staying relatively the same. In 2010 alone over 3 billion dollars were spent to combat marijuana in the United States(The Washington Post), seeing as this war on drugs has cost so much money it needs to be put to an end. The simple solution to the war is the same as basic economics flood the market and the demand will decrease thus lowering prices and run out your competitors. In this case, by legalizing marijuana according to the Washington Post has cut down grower pay by over 60% in the past 5 years. In an article from the Washington Post a discussion between a Mexican grower and an interviewer took place and the grower stated "Two or three years ago, a kilogram [2.2 pounds] of marijuana was worth $60 to $90," a Mexican marijuana grower told NPR news in December 2014. "But now they're paying us $30 to $40 a kilo. It's a big difference. If the U.S. continues to legalize pot, they'll run us into the ground.”(The Washington post) This is exactly the the type of strategy used by countries fighting for oil use to put each other out of business its only to wonder why it took so long for our government to realize the only way to win this decades long war is to legalize marijuana. (Alexandre Meneghini/AP) Through this research paper one can see that marijuana is not as dangerous as it is played out to be. There are not only real benefits to legalizing marijuana for health purposes but also for combating the drug war with south America and for generating tax revenue. Although an addictive drug, like many other legal drugs out their, marijuana if nationally legalized should be used with caution and respect of its risks but could also be the next drug to help change the world.