How Would Marijuana Legalization Affect Pot Consumption?
A new study says that if California legalizes and taxes marijuana, people will probably smoke a lot more pot, and the price will drop dramatically. But the study's authors aren't so sure about their conclusions.
The report by the Rand Corporation is anything but conclusive, admits co-author Rosalie Pacula, who tells KCBS that California's pot proposals go far beyond anything any other government has tried. That makes it tough for her to tell how many more people would smoke marijuana if it were legal. She applied two different demand curves.
Podcast
"You get dramatically different changes in consumption, one suggesting a 75 percent increase in consumption, the other suggesting a 150 percent increase in consumption, and we honestly don't know which is correct," said Pacula.
Either way Pacula says, more people would light up, and they'd pay a lot less, with the price dropping from close to $400 an ounce, to just 38 bucks an ounce. The state would slap a tax on top of that, but Pacula can't say how much that would raise the price until the tax rate is determined.
Dale Gehringer with the pro-pot group California NORML, says there's nothing in this study that will undermine the campaign for Proposition 19 on the November ballot.
"If usage doubled, we would be back to where we were in the 70's and I would remind you that nobody thought that marijuana use was a big problem in the 70's," said Gehringer.
