Posted on 10/23/2021 9:54:17 AM PDT by mylife
California’s cannabis market is booming nearly five years after voters legalized recreational weed. But there’s a catch: the vast majority of pot sales are still underground.
Rather than make cannabis a Main Street fixture, California’s strict regulations have led most industry operators to close shop, flee the state or sell in the state’s illegal market that approaches $8 billion annually, twice the volume of legal sales.
Local government opposition, high taxes and competition from unlicensed businesses are complicating California’s push to build a thriving legal market. Many of those factors are baked into California law, including rules allowing city leaders to shut out licensed cannabis enterprises. Meanwhile, the state has relaxed penalties against illegal operations in the name of racial justice.
Infighting between industry groups and lobbying dysfunction in Sacramento have stalled potential legislative fixes, with no clear end in sight. The scale of those problems has California’s iconic cannabis industry — the legal side, at least — lagging behind other states that have regulated the market.
“You don't have a real cannabis industry if the dominant portion of it has no interest in being legal,” said Adam Spiker, executive director of the Southern California Coalition, a cannabis trade association. “There's no other regulated industry in the world that I know of that operates like that.”
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
So predictable. Liberals are a curse on humanity.
Butt, butt, butt........... Humboldt county is not a place to go jauntily hiking in the woods. Just sayin’. I wonder if all the legal ops are being unduly burdened by caulifourkneeuh’s onerous rules and regs for their grows. The illegal guys, their like honey badgers.
I was in Monterey last week and noticed a shop across from a McDonald’s I’d stopped at. It appeared, like everything else in Monterey, tastefully done and operating as designed. All the customers appeared content.
It seems there are certain types of shady products that are prone to illicit production and distribution, and attracts those who would skirt the rules. Weed, cigs, liquor, etc. Government can only worsen the situation with heavy handed taxes and regulation if it increases the spread between legal and illegal product.
Easy to fix but they won’t do it.
Lower the taxes to the point the black market can’t compete.
I heard about a guy in Colorado who is black market. He was getting $200 an ounce. Colorado legal prices went down due to competition and now he gets $150 in order to stay competitive.
If Colorado cut its taxes a bit, he’d go out of business, wouldn’t be worth the work.
...the state’s illegal market that approaches $8 billion annually, twice the volume of legal sales... Local government opposition, high taxes and competition from unlicensed businesses... rules allowing city leaders to shut out licensed cannabis enterprises. Meanwhile, the state has relaxed penalties against illegal operations in the name of racial justice.
Oh, that's okay then. BTW, the state's population mostly lives in a desert (hey, I saw "Chinatown") made livable (or quasi-livable) by environmental racism, like when entertainment industry nitwits live in houses far too large for anyone to own, and waste water on inground pools and magazine-cover-ready green lawns. /s
Liberals even screw up their own drug industry. Surprise!
This is largely why all the manufacturing jobs are in China. Lower regulations and taxes. Doesn’t really matter what the product.
Yeah, I live here. Some places it’s wise not to go, always carry and try to remember it’s not Bigfoot but the farmer wars in the mountains. Don’t want to get caught up in those.
I don’t know about California, but in Oregon you can grow 4 adult plants legally. No taxes. When I retire or lose my job for refusing the jab, I’m growing my own. That also has the benefit that I know exactly what chemicals if any were used.
But their INTENTIONS are good, so shut up. 🤡
Colorado is convoluted. The guy I know can grow 24 but doesn’t have the room to do so. He does about 8 at a time. He can only legally supply people who have registered their medical cards with him. He sells illegally to everyone else, which is most of his customers.
Colorado has the same problem. The liberal idiots taxed pot to the point it became about $52 a gram. Illegal weed is $8.
😨🙌
free enterprise vs a regulated marketplace.
more proof government can ruin a wet dream.
No surprise. They undercut the greedy government. The stupid government opens up the borders to help the cartels. DuhHHHH
Rats are nothing but sold on themselves stupid.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.