The War on Drugs Part 1: Monetary Effects

We now find ourselves in the midst of the third decade of the war on drugs, as families are destroyed and millions of people are rounded up like swine and placed in your local prisons for drug convictions. Over half of the growth in the prison system over the past two decades is based solely on drug convictions. I believe it is time we assess this war, it’s casualties, and the money involved in making this war against our own people possible. I intend to make this a weekly/monthly article, using this first entry for introductory purposes.

The most recent updates that we can receive from the government about how much money they are spending on illicit drug control is from the ONDCP (Office of National Drug Control Policy) in 2003 which states: “combined expenditures by federal, state, and local governments exceed 30 billion dollars.” In fact we have been spending that much on an annual basis since 1991, which adds up to a grand total of 450 billion dollars of taxpayers money, while the illicit drug market at production levels is around 13 billion annually. In contrast only 1 billion was spent in 1981. On top of this 1.5 million people were arrested for drug violations, almost half (736,000) arrested for marijuana (88% for possession alone). A total of 237,000 were sent to prison on drug charges, if you multiply this by the low estimate cost of housing one prisoner for one year ($20,000), you get a figure of over 948 billion. Has the money thrown at this war had any affect on illicit drug use in this country? No. An estimated 36 million people in this country, aged 12 and older, will use some form of illegal drug this year, which is up from 25 million in 1990. As added food for thought: 83 million Americans reported using marijuana regularly in their lifetime, which means more than likely, someone close to you has used marijuana on a monthly basis at some point in their lives.

A lot of people consider this a racial subject, and while it is true that there are 13 times the amount of black men in prison for drugs as there are white men. It is also true that 72% of females incarcerated in this country are in prison for drug violations. We live in a nation built on racism, and I am not completely sure the human race can exist in a world without racism (then what would we have to argue about, what would black comedians have to write jokes about). This situation is not about race. This is about the government’s ability to tell you what you can and cannot put into your body, and then using your money to enforce these rules.

We are trying to limit the use of the very things that God (if you believe in that sort of thing) put on this earth to be used in constructive ways. Plants that can be used to relieve pain, give you the ability to eat with a debilitating illness, and insight creative thinking. It can be stipulated that the invention of these new and more dangerous drugs, like methamphetamines and ecstasy, would have never occurred if not for the strict regulation of natural illicit drugs.

Next time I will discuss collateral damages and more incarceration statistics, yay!