On the Legalization of Drugs

The following is a paper I wrote for a philosophy class this past spring (2005).

The prohibition of drugs in the United States is mostly based on paternalistic reasons. However, this paternalism seems to be unfounded and seems to be hurting America. Decriminalizing drugs will most likely lead to, among other things, a decrease in the crime rate, an improved American economy, and the cleaning up of drugs (in other words making drugs safer). At the same time, the various arguments supporting drug criminalization have problems that do not warrant drugs to be illegal. In considering the reasons for why drugs should be legalized and the problematic arguments for prohibition, I think drugs should be legalized.

There are several reasons for why drugs need to be legalized. The first reason for this is that the legalization of drugs will lead to a decrease in crime. There are several reasons for why this will likely occur. First, much of the crimes associated with drugs are linked to the black market. According to Mark Thornton, “[v]iolence is used in black markets and [in] criminal organizations to enforce contracts, maintain market share, and defend sales territory” (112). Legalizing drugs, and thus dissolving the black market, would remove these criminal activities, which decreases crime. Violence would no longer need to be used to enforce contracts. Instead, contracts can be enforced, like all legitimate contracts, through the legal system. In terms of maintaining market share and defending sales territory, we do not see legally existing entities using violence to obtain these two goals. For example, I do not recall the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Dell doing a drive-by shooting of the CEO of IBM.

Another reason for why legalizing drugs will decrease crime is that it removes a large portion of financial resources from inner-city street gangs. It is quite well known that gangs are associated with selling illegal drugs. The money gangs obtain from selling drugs is used to, among other things, purchase weapons. These weapons are then used, besides the three criminal activities associated with black markets, to commit other violent crimes, such as armed robbery. However, supporters of prohibition may say that gangs, as a result of losing revenue from selling drugs, would then commit other crimes in order to maintain their status. This is something I disagree with and I will discredit this a little later.

Legalizing drugs will also decrease the number of crimes committed by users who commit crimes in order to support their habit. The high drug prices associated with the black market has been attributed by many for a decent number of crimes committed by habitual users. This is because the black market artificially inflates drug prices, in part due to their illegality. These high prices make it more difficult for addicts to finance their habit. Consequently, they commit crimes in order to finance that addiction. Legalizing drugs will dissolve the black market and the high prices associated with the black market. In other words, drug prices will decrease. This extends the financial resources of addicts and decreases the need for those addicts to commit crimes in order to finance their habit. To illustrate, let’s say that I inhale an ounce of cocaine a day and that an ounce costs $100. At the same time, my weekly income is $500 a week. To finance my addiction, I would need to obtain $200 more in order to do so. One of the ways I can obtain this $200 deficit is through crime. As I have already stated, if drugs were legalized, drug prices would decrease. For the sake of this example, let’s say the price of an ounce of cocaine decreases to $50 on the legal market. Because of this, I now have a surplus of $150. With this surplus of income, I no longer need to commit crimes to finance my habit. From this, supporters of drug prohibition claim that the decreasing of drug prices could lead to an increase in the number of users. However, this is something I do not think will happen, which I will explain this later.

A final reason for why drug legalization will decrease crime is that it frees up police resources. Police Departments across the nation will no longer have to devote resources to disrupting the illegal drug market since it will no longer exist. This allows the police to focus resources on other crimes, which acts as a deterrent to crime. So, as I previously mentioned, if gangs shifted their revenue-seeking activity towards crimes not including the selling of drugs, they will be deterred from doing so because of the extra presence of police.

A second reason for why drugs should be legalized is that it will help the American economy[1]. This is because taxes will more than likely decrease. According to Boyum and Kleiman, “about 20% of all incarcerations involve drug law violations.” Legalizing drugs would ultimately free up space in prisons. This would decrease the cost of prisons, which creates a surplus in the revenue spent on prisons. This can translate into a decrease in taxes. If the tax decrease is applied to income taxes, then two things will occur. First, consumer expenditures, which is considered a driving factor in the American economy, will increase because people have more money in which to spend. Secondly, firms will be persuaded to upgrade their capital[2] through borrowing. This is because interest rates will decrease as a result of people saving more.[3] Because interest represents a cost to firms, a lower interest rate lowers the cost of borrowing. As a result, each firm becomes more efficient in its production.

A final reason for why drugs should be legalized is that the effects of a free, legal market will clean up the various illicit drugs. This is because, according to Thornton, “[t]he competition and discovery process that characterizes the development of a market promote solutions to the problem of drug abuse that prohibition seeks to solve” (150). Thornton further states that “[d]eadly products that survive in black markets would be eliminated” (150). In other words, drugs will become cleaner, instead of being mixed with other agents that can cause harm to the user. Proponents of prohibition argue that this will encourage more people to use drugs like cocaine and heroin, because the cleaning of these drugs removes a factor that deters people from using these drugs. However, even if cleaned, cocaine and heroin still run the risk of both addiction and death from overdosing. Thus, these two factors will still exist to restrain people from using cocaine, heroin, and other drugs.

There are several arguments for the prohibition of drugs that have problems. The first such argument comes from James Q. Wilson’s essay “Against the Legalization of Drugs.” In this essay, Wilson argues that the War on Drugs has kept the level of heroin addicts the same “for over 15 years” (295). According to Wilson, this is because heroin is an illicit drug. However, I offer another reason for why this has occurred. The level of heroin addicts has been level because we now more effectively know and teach to children the various hazards associated with heroin use (and the use of other drugs), such as a high rate of addiction, death from overdosing, and the contraction of diseases from sharing needles. This knowledge acts as a constraint against the use of heroin and other illicit drugs, which then has kept the level of heroin users at a constant level. To show this, we can look at data from the Department of Health and Human Services’ National Survey on Drug Use and Health. In particular, I will be looking at the data for lifetime use of drugs among those ages 12 to 17 in 2002. According to this data, 2.7% used cocaine, 5.7% used hallucinogens. In contrast, 36.8% used tobacco while 43.4% used alcohol. Since all these substances are illegal for those aged 12 to 17, their illegality cannot explain why there is a vast difference in the use of tobacco and alcohol and the use of cocaine and hallucinogens.[4] Instead, the disparity in the use of these substances can be explained by their respective consequences. Users of both cocaine and hallucinogens can see the negative effects, such as overdosing, at the offset of use. In contrast, the use of alcohol and tobacco have negative effects that extend more into the long-run. The survey also has data on alcohol and tobacco use for those aged 18 and older, in which 87.8% reported they had used alcohol in their lifetime and 77.3% had used tobacco in their lifetime.[5] From looking at this data, a prohibitionist would contend that because there is a dramatic increase in the use of alcohol and tobacco from those who cannot legally consume alcohol and tobacco to those who can, the same would happen with illicit drugs if they were legalized. However, I have already noted that the far more dangerous consequences associated with using illegal drugs would prevent this.

Another problematic pro-prohibition argument involves drug education programs. As I have previously stated, drug education programs, such as the Drug Awareness and Resistance Education (DARE) program, teach children about the negative effects of drug use. Wilson claims that “I wonder how credible such programs would be if they were aimed at dissuading children from doing something perfectly legal” (298). The problem with this claim is that, through health courses, schools have taught against alcohol and tobacco use, or at least have taught the consequences associated with using alcohol and tobacco. When I took health courses in both middle and high school, I never once questioned the credibility of these courses, and I would be willing to bet that I was not the only one.

Thomas Constantine has another problematic prohibitionist argument. He states that “[a]t the current time, American communities are being targeted by powerful international drug trafficking organizations.” Constantine further states that “[t]hey saturated U.S. cities with multi-ton quantities of cocaine and created an unprecedented demand. This was a case of supply driving demand.” There are three reasons for why this is problematic. First, supply just does not dictate demand. A firm can flood the market with an obviously highly defective product. It just does not entail that people will buy (demand) this product. To further illustrate, during my freshman year in college, a friend began selling marijuana. The supply of marijuana was there, but that did not influence me to buy and to start smoking marijuana.

Even if Constantine’s claim is true, the reason for why the United States has been flooded with illicit drugs is due to the black market. As I have previously mentioned, black markets inflate prices. This produces the incentive for suppliers of illicit drugs to flood a particular market. The reason is that suppliers receive a higher profit as a result of the artificially inflated prices that are due to the black market. To illustrate, if an ounce of cocaine in a legal market has a price of $50, and the cost of producing an ounce of cocaine is $40, then producers of cocaine see a profit of $10 per ounce of cocaine. Under a prohibitionist regime, I will assume that the price of an ounce of cocaine increases to $100. At the same time, the cost of producing an ounce of cocaine remains the same (at $40). The profit of a supplier of cocaine increases from $10 to $60 per ounce of cocaine. This larger profit under a prohibitionist regime provides the incentive to flood a market with cocaine and other illicit drugs. Consequently, if Constantine’s claim is true, prohibiting drugs is a self-defeating purpose.

The third reason for why Constantine’s argument that supply is driving demand is wrong is that it appears that demand is actually driving supply. According to a History Channel program entitled “Hooked on Illegal Drugs,” demand for illegal drugs skyrocketed during the 1960s and the 1970s. This was in part due to both the counterculture and the disco culture. This dramatic increase in the demand for drugs influenced South American drug producers to flood the United States market with illicit drugs in order to meet the increased demand. This shows a case of demand driving supply, and not supply driving demand.

In conclusion, drugs need to be legalized. Legalizing drugs will likely lead to three things, among others. First, legalizing drugs will likely decrease the crime rate. Second, this course of action will likely help improve the American economy. Lastly, a policy of decriminalization will make drugs cleaner. Furthermore, the various arguments in support of drug prohibition have many problems, which support my claim that drugs need to be legalized.

[1] I should note that I am an economics major.

[2] By capital I mean the factors of production, such as machinery, etc.

[3] When people save more, banks have more money. Because it is not beneficial for banks to just hold on to money, banks lower interest rates in order to influence consumers and producers to borrow and to dissuade consumers and producers from saving more.

[4] This data does run the risk of respondents incorrectly reporting using these substances. Consequently, the percentage of illicit drug use could actually be higher.

[5] The data reported did not have a category for those 21 and over who had used alcohol. Also, these percentages would be smaller if it had only included those who used alcohol and tobacco for first time when they were legally able to do so.

WORKS CITED

Boyum, David and Kleiman, Mark. “Breaking the Drug-Crime Link.” Public Interest.
Summer 2003. Proquest. 1 April 2005. http://proquest.umi.com/.

Constantine, Thomas A. “Drug Legalization Would Lead to Increased Drug Abuse.” 13
July 1999. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. 1 April 2005.
http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/ovcr.

“Hooked on Illegal Drugs.” History Channel. 20 April 2005.

LaFollette, Hugh, ed. Ethics in Practice. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2002.

Thornton, Mark. The Economics of Prohibition. Salt Lake City: University of Utah
Press, 1991.

United States. Dept. of Health and Human Services. Office of Applied Studies.
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Results from the
2002 National Survey on Drug Use and Health: Detailed Tables. September
2003. 10 April 2005. http://www.drugabusestatistics.samhsa.gov/%20nhsda/%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%202k2nsduh/2k2TabsCover.pdf
2k2nsduh/2k2TabsCover.pdf.