Dynamics of Marijuana Supply: Enforcement Effects on Illicit Markets (From Marijuana: Costs of Abuse, Costs of Control, P 107-121, 1989, Mark A R Kleiman -- See NCJ-119206)

• NCJ Number: 119210
• Author(s): M A R Kleiman
• Date Published: 1989
• Length: 15 pages
• Sale Source: Greenwood Publishing Group
• Publication Type: Legislation/Policy Analysis
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

Any change in marijuana consumption that increased enforcement resources might produce should be weighed against the adverse societal effects caused through the illicit market enterprise.

Abstract

In principle, drug enforcement can create public benefits by reducing drug consumption, by controlling the "spillover" of violence and corruption from illicit markets, and by limiting the problems of perceived fairness and the damage to public morale caused by notorious criminal wealth. Since new money spent on Federal marijuana enforcement efforts will have little effect on drug consumption, its justification must come from its benefits in terms of "spillover" crime and perceived fairness. It is not clear, however, that increased enforcement will ameliorate these problems rather than exacerbate them. A 13-percent rise in marijuana retail prices and localized marijuana shortages, although slightly ameliorating the marijuana consumption problem, will tend to concentrate the marijuana trafficking problem. Increased enforcement would have two major effects in this regard; it would raise total illicit revenues in the marijuana market by raising the price of an inelastically demanded commodity, and it would increase the nondrug crime intensity of the market by forcing the marijuana industry to become more conspiratorial and rewarding the most enforcement-resistant competitors. 6 notes.