Interesting stats on legal pot

[Snipe]

A couple of economists have made some interesting findings.

More Pot, Less Beer, and Fewer Traffic Fatalities (http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2011/12/more-pot-less-beer-and-fewer-traffic.html)


"To date, 16 states have passed medical marijuana laws, yet very little is known about their effects. Using state-level data, we examine the relationship between medical marijuana laws and a variety of outcomes. Legalization of medical marijuana is associated with increased use of marijuana among adults, but not among minors. In addition, legalization is associated with a nearly 9 percent decrease in traffic fatalities, most likely due to its impact on alcohol consumption. Our estimates provide strong evidence that marijuana and alcohol are substitutes."

Makes intuitive sense to me. We know that alcohol kills many people. When people are given a viable substitute for alcohol it appears they use it.

Say you drive to a Columbus for an Ohio State game and you have to drive back the same day. If you hit that tailgate hard you will mostly sober up by games end, but you will still probably be driving drunk and a relative danger on the road. Now lets say you burn one at that tailgate. By the time that game is over I can't see it having any impact on your driving. You substituted one good for another, and still had a rocking good time at that tailgate.

If this turns out to be true and that facts can be repeated in other states, that is quite a loss of life. If we could cut traffic fatalities by 10%, you suddenly have to confront an ethical question of how can we possibly keep this stuff illegal?

I am skeptical of the data, and everyone should be. Traffic fatalities have been declining over the years as well as of late. We would need credible skeptics to look at their data with a fine tooth comb. Around 35,000 people die in traffic fatalities every year. Cutting that number by 10% would impact a lot of lives.

I think that the Pot and Alcohol are substitutes. I know some people that substitute them. I think Alcohol leads to drunken driving, domestic violence and increased gun-play. Pot is not good for you either, but it doesn't have the same bad side effects that alcohol does. I would expect domestic violence to go down as alcohol use goes down (as it is substituted for pot).

We are never going to have a perfect world, but a better one is certainly an option.

[Porkopolis]

I'd rep you if the man wasn't keeping me down. Somebody take care of that man for me!

[nuts4xu]

Some of the biggest opponents to legalizing marijuana are the beer and alcohol companies. The data gathered is limited, and somewhat incomplete. I will be curious to see the same study run 10 years from now to better judge the correlation.

Interesting stuff Snipe.

[chico]

Some of the biggest opponents to legalizing marijuana are the beer and alcohol companies. The data gathered is limited, and somewhat incomplete. I will be curious to see the same study run 10 years from now to better judge the correlation.

Interesting stuff Snipe.

You'd think the beer and alcohol lobby would be offset by the snack food lobby.

[pizza delivery]

Drinking and smoking pot is very dangerous to driving, however. If I were going out, I would be drinking beer. If I were smoking weed, I'd be staying near the fridge. I don't think that many people would smoke weed socially, like at Thanksgiving parties. It's just so intense. It's a great Wednesday night drug, perhaps all day Saturday, Sunday before dinner. It starts sounding great after about 5-6 beers, but it will put a quick end to your coherence soon after. Generally, it slows you down and keeps you in one place. Most people are doing that anyway, it just adds some variety to life. Legalize it!

[D-West & PO-Z]

Mary Jane is no substitute for my booze, not even close.

I think pizzadelievery is correct too, I'm not sure that many people would do it as a social thing like alcohol. You can have a few drinks and not get drunk. If you are smoking weed you are doing it to get high.

[Ledgewood]

When I was a senior, I had one of those rotating pizza ovens. Me and my roomates put pizza roles on top of the pizza and made a pizza roll pizza. We pretty much ate all of the pizza roles before the pizza was done cooking though. Wait, what were we talking about? Xavier by 7.

[LadyMuskie]

I'm all for legalizing pot, and not because I plan on becoming a pothead once it's legal. I just think we could tax the crap out of it and alleviate some of our financial woes. If it causes less drinking and driving fatalities then that just bolsters my opinion about legalizing it. The only thing is that, in Ohio, at least, if you can't smoke in public, then pot is going to fall under that no smoking rule. So, I'm not sure how it will replace alcohol in that sense.

[boozehound]

I don't really think about it as replacing alcohol, particularly not in social settings. What could start to happen is people all sitting around somebody's house getting baked instead of going out and drinking. Or people just leave the house less period so they aren't driving as much.

I don't really see Pot as a substitute for alcohol in many social situations. The tailgate example that Snipe mentioned is a pretty textbook example of an instance in which I, personally, would not want to swap pot for alcohol. I can't imagine a lot of less fun things to do while high than stand around at a tailgate and then attend a football game.

I just think that they should legalize pot because it is basically harmless.

[Snipe]

I am not saying that pot and alcohol are substitutes that are exactly equal in all respects. In fact the data seems to show that people have different outcomes and consumption patterns when you throw legal pot into the mix. These guys are saying that pot and alcohol are substitutes in an economic or a broad sense. They see alcohol consumption going down and pot consumption going up. Then they see a decrease in alcohol related maladies. I don't think that is a bad theory and I agree with it.

You would still have alcohol at your dinners parties. Alcohol will always be with us. It is the great social lubricant. It gives guys the "liquid courage" to ask a girl out, and it makes the women more likely to be more randy and promiscuous. My wife gets a little frisky with a bit of drink. Never miss a chance to ply her with some of the sauce when the opportunity provides.

I reject the thought that pot is not a social drug just on past experience. Maybe it isn't for your Christmas party or Thanksgiving family get together, I will give you that but different strokes for different folks. What if a friend of yours had ten acres and he was going to have a bonfire and a pig roast on Super Bowl Sunday. He was inviting all his other friends to have a "bake off" smoke some blunts, watch football and eat chunks of pig right off the spit. I think that could be a highly social experience. And you wouldn't have people driving drunk home afterward.

Alcohol and pot are different for sure. One will not replace the other. It does seem to me from this study that using pot in some situations can cut down on some of the downsides of alcohol.

The numbers involved are not insubstantial. The number of fatalities in our current wars to date pale in comparison to the number of fatalities on our roads in any single year. Cutting that number down is a great objective.

Who thought that smoking a blunt would turn out to be the responsible thing to do?

Can someone give me a parody of what one of the "public interest" ads on the subject would look like?

[Snipe]

I don't really think about it as replacing alcohol, particularly not in social settings. What could start to happen is people all sitting around somebody's house getting baked instead of going out and drinking. Or people just leave the house less period so they aren't driving as much.

I don't really see Pot as a substitute for alcohol in many social situations. The tailgate example that Snipe mentioned is a pretty textbook example of an instance in which I, personally, would not want to swap pot for alcohol. I can't imagine a lot of less fun things to do while high than stand around at a tailgate and then attend a football game.

I just think that they should legalize pot because it is basically harmless.

Maybe tailgating is a bad example. I think part of the fact that pot makes people a little paranoid and crowd weary is that pot is illegal. If you smoke pot and you smell like reefer and you are acting like a stoner maybe everyone will "know"! If it wasn't against the law, maybe the paranoia and crowd fear would go away a bit. I don't know. I confess that it made me paranoid, and crowds were not my idea of fun.

I certainly didn't want to go to a bar and hang out when I partied back in college. Part of that is that if you aren't drinking, bars aren't as much fun. They really are badly lit places where drunk people go to be loud and stupid. If you aren't drunk it isn't much fun. You are just like "why am I here again when I could be chillin on the couch watching the HBO comedy special".

[ThrowDownDBrown]

Drinking and smoking pot is very dangerous to driving, however. If I were going out, I would be drinking beer. If I were smoking weed, I'd be staying near the fridge. I don't think that many people would smoke weed socially, like at Thanksgiving parties. It's just so intense. It's a great Wednesday night drug, perhaps all day Saturday, Sunday before dinner. It starts sounding great after about 5-6 beers, but it will put a quick end to your coherence soon after. Generally, it slows you down and keeps you in one place. Most people are doing that anyway, it just adds some variety to life. Legalize it!

I don't think weed is dangerous for driving. Whenever I'd drive high I would get paranoid that there would be cops or that I'd hit someone so I would drive the speed limit and use all my blinkers. If anything weed makes me drive better.

[Ledgewood]

Hi, I'm Cool Jason. You know, I might kid alot on stage and on internet message boards, but drunk driving is no joke. So this weekend, when you and your pals are trying to cop a cool buzz before cheering your team onto victory, spark up a blunt instead of slamming food colored bud light and jeagerbombs. You just might save a life.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-V_UFO5w1r_Y/TZTJfLOCL0I/AAAAAAAAAIw/4K8CGXUmfmI/s1600/the_more_you_know.jpg

[Snipe]

Props Ledgewood. Cool Jason did the right thing!

[Kahns Krazy]

A couple of economists have made some interesting findings.

More Pot, Less Beer, and Fewer Traffic Fatalities (http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2011/12/more-pot-less-beer-and-fewer-traffic.html)



Makes intuitive sense to me. We know that alcohol kills many people. When people are given a viable substitute for alcohol it appears they use it.

Say you drive to a Columbus for an Ohio State game and you have to drive back the same day. If you hit that tailgate hard you will mostly sober up by games end, but you will still probably be driving drunk and a relative danger on the road. Now lets say you burn one at that tailgate. By the time that game is over I can't see it having any impact on your driving. You substituted one good for another, and still had a rocking good time at that tailgate.

.

Unless you tailgate with Nuts, in which case you will still be too stupid to be in public after 6 hours.

It would be interesting if legalizing it would reverse the trend to make pot as insanely potent as possible.

[Fred Garvin 2.0]

I didn't realize there were so many hurdles to smoking pot before a tailgate or pig roast.

[pizza delivery]

Much of the weed out there will get you completely smacked up for 4+ hours (don't call your doctor), especially if you aren't a very regular user. I wish there was a way to toke similar to having 2 beers. It's like shuffle board, just one little push and you're gliding for much further than you think. So yeah, like Kahns said, maybe the government knows best. :D

[pizza delivery]

I didn't realize there were so many hurdles to smoking pot before a tailgate or pig roast.

You probably don't realize who's watching you either.

[Fred Garvin 2.0]

You probably don't realize who's watching you either.

Is this gonna be a dissertation on the evils of the Patriot Act or am I just paranoid from all the pot I smoked?

[BBC 08]

Paranoid. Android.

[pizza delivery]

Is this gonna be a dissertation on the evils of the Patriot Act or am I just paranoid from all the pot I smoked?

Paranoid. Although, to me, crowds seem pretty safe.

[ford]

I have always felt that there is one main reason why pot is illegal. Whether it's true or rational, the perception is it makes you lazy and could impact the overall industriousness of our society. Protestant work ethic built this country, Pot-estant work ethic could devolve us further behind countries like China.

That said, I hate hippies and am all for doing anything to prevent more of them from happening. I also wish I could walk to walgreens and buy a dime bag right now.

[smileyy]

The State of Washington will likely have a "Legalize Marijuana for Personal Use" measure on next year's ballot. How it would actually work out if the measure passed (due to federal prohibition) has yet to be determined.

[Cincypunk.org]

I have always felt that there is one main reason why pot is illegal. Whether it's true or rational, the perception is it makes you lazy and could impact the overall industriousness of our society. Protestant work ethic built this country, Pot-estant work ethic could devolve us further behind countries like China.

That said, I hate hippies and am all for doing anything to prevent more of them from happening. I also wish I could walk to walgreens and buy a dime bag right now.

The thing that sucks about getting older and getting past high school/college, etc is now where do I turn to for weed.

Anyone?

[spazzrico]

The thing that sucks about getting older and getting past high school/college, etc is now where do I turn to for weed.

Anyone?

P.M. me........


Just kidding...............



Seriously though..........



Dear Lord don't! What are you trying to get me fired???





I'm hungry.

[spazzrico]

The State of Washington will likely have a "Legalize Marijuana for Personal Use" measure on next year's ballot. How it would actually work out if the measure passed (due to federal prohibition) has yet to be determined.

I think you would have a lot of happy garden supply stores. My guess it would basically be de facto decriminalization. Federal enforcement requires a very high threshold (mucho $$$) for them to actually take on a case. It would be way under their radar. That said I don't know if the Federal provisions could outright cancel the state ones. Not sure about how the interface works.

[nuts4xu]

Unless you tailgate with Nuts, in which case you will still be too stupid to be in public after 6 hours.


I have never heard anyone complain about having a bad time with Nuts at a tailgate. Just saying....