Washington, DC: Increased federal spending on marijuana law enforcement has not been associated with a reduction in marijuana use, according to a report released today by the Washington DC think-tank, the Justice Policy Institute (JPI).
The report, entitled “Efficacy and Impact: The Criminal Justice Response to Marijuana Policy in the United States,” concludes that marijuana usage in the US has been relatively unaffected by increases in federal anti-drug spending and arrests for marijuana-related violations. For example, the report found that reported marijuana usage rose 22 percent during the 1990s, despite a 127 percent increase in marijuana arrests.
In 2003, the most recent year for which data is available, law enforcement arrested an estimated 755,000 Americans for marijuana violations – the highest total ever recorded in a single year. In 7 out of 10 states, marijuana arrests now comprise over half of all drug arrests, JPI reported. “Despite billions in new spending and hundreds of thousands of new arrests, marijuana use seems unaffected by the huge criminal justice response to this drug,” said JPI Executive Director Jason Ziedenberg, who co-authored the report. “As law enforcement focuses on marijuana, a significant number of people are suffering from the impact of policies that do not seem to be deterring drug use.”
A previous report published by the NORML Foundation in March concluded that rising marijuana arrest rates have not been associated with a reduction in marijuana use, reduced marijuana availability, a reduction in the number of new marijuana users, reduced treatment admissions, reduced emergency room mentions of marijuana, any reduction in marijuana potency, or any increases in the price of marijuana.
Most recently, an economic report released by the Washington, DC think-tank Taxpayers for Common Sense estimated that the federal government annually spends more than $3.6 billion dollars on anti-marijuana related activities, “yet little evidence indicates this spending accomplishes the government’s stated goal of reducing marijuana use.” Previous economic reports analyzing the cost of marijuana arrest expenditures at the state and local level have estimated these costs to be between $5 and $7 billion per year.
For more information, please contact either Allen St. Pierre or Paul Armentano of NORML at (202) 483-5500. Full text of the report, “Efficacy and Impact: The Criminal Justice Response to Marijuana Policy in the United States,” is available online at: http://www.justicepolicy.org