By Ty Miller

In December of 2012, Washington and Colorado implemented the legalization of possession and use of marijuana for recreational purposes. Following this, January of 2014, Colorado opened the first recreational marijuana dispensaries in the United States. Although the debate about recreational marijuana has been fought in the public and academic spheres, we have limited empirical data as to the effect of these policies. With this, arguments in regard to whether marijuana should be legalized in the United States have far outpaced reliable scientific research. As more states, and potentially the federal government, begin to vote on whether to legalize, reliable research will be necessary. Sociology provides possible theoretical justifications for both sides of the recreational marijuana debate. However, there is still relatively little research on the effects of legalization in the United States. The current project analyzes changes in measures of excessive drinking, crime, DUI-related fatalities, and DUI arrests in Washington and Colorado following legalization of recreational marijuana. Each set of analyses are carried out in two parts. First, I examine the effects of legalizing possession and use in 2013. Second, I examine the effects of opening recreational dispensaries in Colorado in 2014. These separate analyses are utilized to uncover any shock-effects that might be inherently tied to legalization of possession and use or the opening of recreational dispensaries. Results indicate that, in most of the analyses, there are no significant effects of either part of legalization on the outcome variables of interest. The lone significant effect is that policing of DUI appears to increase following the legalization of possession and use in Washington and Colorado in 2013. The implications of these findings for both sociological theory and policy-making are discussed in the concluding chapter

West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University, 2018. 282p.

By Jeffrey A. Singer and Sophia Heimow 

  Every state except Alaska has laws that criminalize the possession and/or sale of paraphernalia for the consumption of illicit drugs. State-level drug paraphernalia laws prevent people who use those drugs from accessing the means to reduce the risk of infection or overdose. This makes nonmedical drug use even more dangerous because the laws often prevent access to clean needles and syringes along with products to test drugs for deadly contaminants. These laws are meant to discourage illicit drug use. Instead, they produce avoidable disease and death. Drug prohibition puts peaceful, voluntary drug users at risk of losing their liberty and often their lives. Paraphernalia laws similarly increase the risk that users will lose their lives. Some states have amended their laws to permit harmreduction programs and tools. For example, many states allow syringe services programs (also called SSPs or “needle exchange programs”) to operate within narrowly defined parameters. The goal of drug paraphernalia policy should be to save lives by reducing the risks of overdose and disease. This means removing government barriers to obtaining and distributing clean syringes and drug testing equipment. Because Alaska leaves residents free to purchase syringes and other paraphernalia in any quantity, anyone can operate an SSP and implement other harm-reduction measures. States should follow Alaska’s lead by repealing their drug paraphernalia laws so that programs aimed at reducing overdoses and disease can proliferate and succeed.

Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 2022. 24p.