11 Ways the Drug War Raises Your Taxes and Shrinks Your Profits

[xchrom]

http://www.alternet.org/economy/11-ways-drug-war-raises-your-taxes-and-shrinks-your-profits



***SNIP

(1) You have fewer customers because the war on drugs reduces purchasing power.

Over the last twenty years, more than seven million Americans received felony convic- tions for possessing drugs or selling them. Tens of millions of others have criminal records for arrests or misdemeanor drug convictions. Many of these people are drug-free, but struggle to find a job and a regular paycheck. Ex-felons are rarely hired for responsible jobs – typically they are underemployed, if employed at all. Tens of millions of potential customers can’t buy what you are trying to sell. Our prison population has grown by two million persons over forty years. People in prison don’t buy Fords or Chevrolets. Japan and Germany do not hurt their domestic motor vehicle markets by filling their prisons with young people, drug offenders, or substance abusers.

(2) Your potential customers can’t buy your products because the war on drugs has de- prived them of credit.

Typically, one-third of your customers use a credit card at the cash register ( 1, citation link at end ). Ex-felons’ applications for credit are often rejected, even if they have regular jobs. In many neighborhoods, a significant fraction of the men and women walking by your door can’t buy your goods or order your goods and services by Internet or telephone.

(3) Fewer customers walk by your door due to drug prohibition crime.

If you are a retailer, you depend on foot traffic. Crime and disorder outside your doors drives potential customers away. Fortunately, crime rates have gone down in much of America, but the salient fact of the war on drugs is that it causes crime among competing sellers, crime as thieves attempt to rob drug dealers, and crime that is committed by com- pulsive users to get the money to buy their drugs.

***SNIP

(4) Your overhead is higher because insurance premiums and security cost more.

Every business needs property and loss insurance. Losses from shoplifting were estimated at $11.7 billion in 2009, according to the National Retail Security Survey. In 2009, total retail losses cost retailers $33.5 billion. Total overall victim losses from all property crimes excluding arson totaled $15.7 billion in 2010, according to the FBI. Even if your business was not a victim last year, those losses translate into higher insurance premiums for you. And to prevent crime against your business, you pay for security personnel, equipment and services.

[Warren DeMontague]

1. It's a waste of lives, resources, and energy.

A loser for everyone except those directly benefiting from the gravy train.

[LuvNewcastle]

2. And the people on the gravy train are usually worse people than

the ones who are locked up. Most decent people don't want anything to do with the Prison/ Security/ Surveillance Complex.

[Scuba]

3. On the other hand ...

http://reason.com/archives/2012/04/22/4-industries-getting-rich-off-the-drug-w/2

[NaturalHigh]

4. The drug war was lost at least thirty years ago.

Like Prohibition, it made criminals rich and created brutal factions of organized criminals. The fact that we still spend billions fighting for a lost cause should prove to everyone once and for all that a lot of rich people are getting richer and kicking a share of their gains back to their favorite politicians in the form of campaign contributions.