INTRODUCTION Legalizing marijuana in the United States would benefit our country in many different ways. The legalization of marijuana has the potential to have a positive impact on the United States because it would allow the United States government to spend less on enforcing laws against recreational use, could possibly save American’s money on pharmaceutical drugs, and could create tax revenue for the United States government.
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According to the American Civil Liberties Union, from 2001 to 2010 there were approximately 8.2 million drug related arrests. As you can see in figure 1, marijuana possession arrests claimed nearly 50% of all drug related arrests made in 2010. That means that we, as taxpayers, paid $31,000 per prisoner per …show more content…
As of right now insurance companies do not cover the cost of medical marijuana because of the current standing federal law banning marijuana use (Yrkoski, 2015). I am not educated on what prescriptions could be substituted with marijuana, but I know there are numerous uses. For example, some cancer and glaucoma patients are prescribed medical marijuana because it takes the edge off of the side effects or pain caused by treatment. When and if marijuana is legalized, insurance companies and patients could save money. This is because pharmaceutical drugs are outrageous and some people that need them the most simply cannot afford to buy the medication. In some cases, marijuana could be an answer. According to Marijuana Business Daily (Figure 2), the average out of pocket costs for buying one dose of medical marijuana is somewhere between $60 to $100 per patient. The legalization of marijuana could benefit those people that have and don’t have insurance. By having insurance it would lower the out of pocket costs per patient. But when the Federal Government legalizes marijuana the demand will not change, but the price will drop dramatically due to the fact that there will be less of a risk for distributing and using marijuana