Harvard Economist: Legalizing Drugs Suits Ideal of American Freedom

23536

23536

Bluelight Crew
Joined
Dec 16, 2010
Messages
7,725
Location
Stop resisting!
http://www.spiegel.de/international...n-why-drugs-should-be-legalized-a-886289.html

SPIEGEL: Mr. Miron, why should heroin, cocaine and marijuana be legal?

Miron: The prohibition of drugs is the worst solution for preventing abuse. Firstly, it brings about a black market that is corrupt and costs human lives. Secondly, it constrains people who wouldn't abuse drugs. Thirdly, prohibiting drugs is expensive.

SPIEGEL: How expensive?

Miron: If it legalized drugs, the United States could save $85 billion to $90 billion per year. Roughly half that is spent on the current drugs policy and half that is lost in taxes that the state could have levied on legal drugs.

SPIEGEL: On the other side of the equation, there are many people who would become addicted to drugs.

Miron: Let us assume that the consumption of drugs would increase as a result of legalization. Would that be a bad thing? If we apply the standards of economics, that is (at least partially) a good thing. Any policy that prevents me from doing what I'd like to do impairs my happiness.

SPIEGEL: Drugs lead to addiction. They impair people's happiness.

Miron: Addiction isn't the problem. Many people are addicted to caffeine and nobody worries about that. Many people are addicted to sports, beer or food. That doesn't bother the state either.

SPIEGEL: Should the state treat sports and cocaine equally?

Miron: The effects of cocaine are described in a highly exaggerated way. There are Wall Street bankers who snort coke; they have high incomes, access to a good healthcare system, are married and have a stable life situation. Many of them subsequently stop taking cocaine. I get the impression that these people enjoy consuming it. Then there are people who smoke crack cocaine and lead lives that are very different from those of stockbrokers; they are people with low incomes, no jobs and poor health. Many of these people come to a sorry end. But cocaine's not to blame for that. Those people's lousy lives are to blame.

SPIEGEL: Are you trying to say that crack is harmless?

Miron: Can you consume crack for a long time and then give it up? Absolutely, and that's supported by the data. The prohibition lobby exaggerates substantially to help it achieve its goals. Drugs are far less dangerous than people think. It's not clear that consuming marijuana or cocaine has significant negative effects if the product is affordable, if we don't have to risk our lives to get it, and if the product hasn't been diluted secretly with rat poison.

SPIEGEL: Are you trying to say it's not dangerous to shoot heroin?

Miron: Injecting it is so widespread because, under prohibition, heroin is expensive and injecting makes users high for less money. If drugs were much less expensive, most people would probably smoke heroin rather than injecting it.

SPIEGEL: One more time: do you think it would be good if legalization led to an increased consumption of drugs?

Miron: If you believe in anything that the Americans claim to believe in -- freedom, individuality, personal responsibility -- you have to legalize drugs. The maxim should be that you're allowed to do it if you're not harming anyone else. There is an assumption that you're harming someone when you take drugs, but the scientific data doesn't support this hypothesis.

cont. http://www.spiegel.de/international...n-why-drugs-should-be-legalized-a-886289.html
 
I think that this guy makes a lot of sense, but clearly is not an expert on drugs. Crack IS worse due to the rapid absorption of smoking vs. snorting, and the issues of IV drug abuse are brushed off. Doesn't mean I don't agree with the general premise.
 
I think he realizes all of that, while also realizing that none of it is really 'a big deal'.
 
I still doubt that most IV heroin users would switch to smoking if prices were lowered. Injection is more than a cost cutting measure.

This is nonetheless an excellent interview! I guess Jeffrey Miron is responsible for the "heroin should be sold in supermarkets" idea. I have added him to my pantheon of contemporary thinkers.
 
23536 said:
I still doubt that most IV heroin users would switch to smoking if prices were lowered. Injection is more than a cost cutting measure.

This is nonetheless an excellent interview! I guess Jeffrey Miron is responsible for the "heroin should be sold in supermarkets" idea. I have added him to my pantheon of contemporary thinkers.
Click to expand...


From what I've read on here, the effect of injection is really pleasurable. I would guess at least the IV users would stick to IV. I mean, if they were guaranteed clean equipment and a pure form of the drug with a safe place to use, then the harm would be minimized.
 
Many of those currently injecting would continue injecting, yes, because they're addicted to the ritual of it (although not all, I'd personally love it if I could afford to snort/smoke my opiates, I hate the effort of IV use), but the new generation of users would be far less likely to take up IV use, I'd imagine.

Of course this is entirely anecdotal, but my own experience both among my opiate using friends/associates and within the HR community, is that a large majority of IV users start out smoking/snorting, and only turn to the needle when those ROA's become too expensive. If cost wasn't an issue, they would keep smoking/snorting instead of taking upon themselves the stress/mess/damage/fear/risk/stigma of IV use and never become addicted to the ritual in the first place.

That said, I still wouldn't want opiates sold completely openly in the fashion of alcohol or tobacco (except for perhaps the weaker ones like codeine/DHC/tramadol). To me, the ideal compromise would be to establish clinics, where users can register and dose in a regulated, medically supervised setting using the pharmaceutical grade opiate of their choice through whichever ROA they desire, and being offered a quantity of extended release doses if they can't attend the clinic for a period of time, in a manner similar to how current replacement therapy programs offer take home doses. This would cut down on overdose significantly, make it much harder for anyone underage to obtain the drugs and hopefully prevent opiate use being too glamorized. Yeah it would be a pain in the ass and nowhere near as fun as buying an ounce of #3 from the corner store to smoke at home, but unless a study was done which proved that a full availability wouldn't increase fatality, I couldn't bring myself to suport it.
 
Last edited:
In my experience, first time opiate users don't want to jump in head first and inject heroin. If heroin was legalized, I don't think we'd see opiate naive people lining up at a dispensing clinic to shoot up.

Opiate addiction is usually a creeper. Or a time bomb if you want to think of it that way. It is usually after a very long time of controlled use, with large breaks and the law enforcement and media's lies which are fed to people daily are ignored because people are experiencing nothing like what they have heard about using opiates. "Use it once and you're hooked forever".

When people start to realise that they've been lied to for their whole lives and they start to feel that they have control over their bodies and their drug intake, they start to use a little more. Then, maybe an opportunity to use a needle comes along - quite possibly because it is expensive to smoke or snort. Then, things do go downhill quicker than a dopesick person running to the toilet when he's in the height of withdrawals and needs to empty his bowels for the tenth time that hour. Scared of wiping his ass because of the pain, considering just spending the rest of the day on the toilet. But of course, there's the possibility that you may be able to find some money to make you feel better, so you get off the toilet, knowing that you'll be back.

Wait, the point is legalizing heroin is a good thing.
 
In my experience, first time opiate users don't want to jump in head first and inject heroin. If heroin was legalized, I don't think we'd see opiate naive people lining up at a dispensing clinic to shoot up.
Click to expand...

Ideally such a clinic wouldn't just offer injection. They could dose any way they choose, the point is the medical staff on hand to prevent overdose.
 
I started out by injecting. Am I an oddball? My mentor told me I'd be missing out if I didn't inject.

That first time, it was too intense for me to even enjoy it. When I came back to the drug, I snorted for a whole year before shifting to injection. Always hated smoking.

But there's a rush that's specific to injection, and I wouldn't want to miss that. As I understand it, it has everything to do with the pharmacology of the intermediate between heroin and morphine. More info here:

http://www.bluelight.ru/vb/threads/...of-how-heroin-affects-brain-(HEROIN-MORPHINE)
 
The reason drugs should be be legal is first off who the fuck has the right to tell us what to do??? Oh yeah, the government. If drugs were legal and addicts were able to buy their daily doses for a reasonable price at a pharmacy, they could carry on normal lives and not have to spend every moment scrounging up change for their next fix.

Also about IVing- Theres no way I'd switch from IV to smoking if it were legal!! That's where the beautiful rush comes from
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top