In a major coup for pro-legalization group Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, Nicholas Kristof, columnist for The New York Times, hitched himself to the group's mantra in a Sunday editorial exploring the downfalls of a government fighting a war against its own people.
From The New York Times:
If you could change America's drug policy, what would you do? Let's hear your ideas for reducing the harmful impacts of not just addiction, but prohibition itself.
-- Stephen C. Webster
<small> This entry was posted on Sunday, June 14th, 2009 at 7:14 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. </small>
June 13, 2009, 10:04 pm
Time to Legalize Drugs?
By Nicholas Kristof
My Sunday column looks at the 40-year “war on drugs” and argue that it has failed and that it is time for a dramatic rethink of drug policy. I haven’t written about drugs before because I’ve been ambivalent — in particular, I’ve worried that liberalization would lead to an increase in drug use. I’m not one of those who thinks that drugs are fine — on the contrary, I’ve seen how narcotics can devastate families, even countries. My home town of Yamhill, Oregon, has been hit hard by the Meth explosion.
Yet over the last year I’ve swung toward liberalization, for three reasons. First, the evidence suggests that any increase in use from liberalization would be minor, if there was one at all. Second, Mexico and Afghanistan have shown how American drug policy empowers foreign cartels/terrorists and destabilizes foreign countries. Third, the tens of billions of dollars spent on the drug war seem a vast misallocation of resources at a time we’re struggling to pay for education and health care.
I don’t know precisely what policy I’m in favor of. Decriminalization to start with, as some European countries have done. But maybe we should look at a legalization model as well, with state liquor stores or pharmacists selling narcotics and raising money through taxes. With cigarettes we’ve seen that an aggressive combination of taxation and public health campaigning can reduce addictive behavior, so maybe those are the better tools to apply to narcotics. I hope to continue looking at these issues and thinking about them. Your thoughts most welcome.
From The New York Times:
Here in the United States, four decades of drug war have had three consequences:
First, we have vastly increased the proportion of our population in prisons. The United States now incarcerates people at a rate nearly five times the world average. In part, that’s because the number of people in prison for drug offenses rose roughly from 41,000 in 1980 to 500,000 today. Until the war on drugs, our incarceration rate was roughly the same as that of other countries.
Second, we have empowered criminals at home and terrorists abroad. One reason many prominent economists have favored easing drug laws is that interdiction raises prices, which increases profit margins for everyone, from the Latin drug cartels to the Taliban. Former presidents of Mexico, Brazil and Colombia this year jointly implored the United States to adopt a new approach to narcotics, based on the public health campaign against tobacco.
Third, we have squandered resources. Jeffrey Miron, a Harvard economist, found that federal, state and local governments spend $44.1 billion annually enforcing drug prohibitions. We spend seven times as much on drug interdiction, policing and imprisonment as on treatment. (Of people with drug problems in state prisons, only 14 percent get treatment.)
Kristof prominently quotes Norm Stamper, a former police chief and member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition. He also pulls some ideas from Jeffrey Miron, a Harvard economist who has become a leading anti-prohibition advocate for his analysis of the economic impact of black markets. First, we have vastly increased the proportion of our population in prisons. The United States now incarcerates people at a rate nearly five times the world average. In part, that’s because the number of people in prison for drug offenses rose roughly from 41,000 in 1980 to 500,000 today. Until the war on drugs, our incarceration rate was roughly the same as that of other countries.
Second, we have empowered criminals at home and terrorists abroad. One reason many prominent economists have favored easing drug laws is that interdiction raises prices, which increases profit margins for everyone, from the Latin drug cartels to the Taliban. Former presidents of Mexico, Brazil and Colombia this year jointly implored the United States to adopt a new approach to narcotics, based on the public health campaign against tobacco.
Third, we have squandered resources. Jeffrey Miron, a Harvard economist, found that federal, state and local governments spend $44.1 billion annually enforcing drug prohibitions. We spend seven times as much on drug interdiction, policing and imprisonment as on treatment. (Of people with drug problems in state prisons, only 14 percent get treatment.)
If you could change America's drug policy, what would you do? Let's hear your ideas for reducing the harmful impacts of not just addiction, but prohibition itself.
-- Stephen C. Webster
<small> This entry was posted on Sunday, June 14th, 2009 at 7:14 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. </small>
June 13, 2009, 10:04 pm
Time to Legalize Drugs?
By Nicholas Kristof
My Sunday column looks at the 40-year “war on drugs” and argue that it has failed and that it is time for a dramatic rethink of drug policy. I haven’t written about drugs before because I’ve been ambivalent — in particular, I’ve worried that liberalization would lead to an increase in drug use. I’m not one of those who thinks that drugs are fine — on the contrary, I’ve seen how narcotics can devastate families, even countries. My home town of Yamhill, Oregon, has been hit hard by the Meth explosion.
Yet over the last year I’ve swung toward liberalization, for three reasons. First, the evidence suggests that any increase in use from liberalization would be minor, if there was one at all. Second, Mexico and Afghanistan have shown how American drug policy empowers foreign cartels/terrorists and destabilizes foreign countries. Third, the tens of billions of dollars spent on the drug war seem a vast misallocation of resources at a time we’re struggling to pay for education and health care.
I don’t know precisely what policy I’m in favor of. Decriminalization to start with, as some European countries have done. But maybe we should look at a legalization model as well, with state liquor stores or pharmacists selling narcotics and raising money through taxes. With cigarettes we’ve seen that an aggressive combination of taxation and public health campaigning can reduce addictive behavior, so maybe those are the better tools to apply to narcotics. I hope to continue looking at these issues and thinking about them. Your thoughts most welcome.
