Silk Road forums
Discussion => Philosophy, Economics and Justice => Topic started by: connoisseur on February 03, 2013, 08:40 am
-
While we are far from public acceptance of what is falsely categorized as "hard drugs" and this includes psychedelics, it is widely overlooked that there is a fundamental problem in taxing weed: It can't be done effectively.
As cannabis production increasingly shifts from large producers to small scale growers who nurture a few plants for their own habit and distribute to handfuls of mates there is no lever for the state concerning taxation.
If you have the choice between a pack of joints with a government tax banderole for let's say 25 dollars/euros and your own grow which you lovingly tended to a harvest; which way will you go?
I actually prefer my kids to spend their time and efforts on producing great buds that will get you the best high of all, as every puff comes with the knowledge that it was YOU or YOUR GODD FRIEND who invested his energy into it.
Once weed is legalized it comes down to the normal market forces: Quality and affordability.
There may be a grain of truth in the saying that California growers did not want it to be legalized as prices would drop by as much as 80 to 90%, eroding all profits overnight.
Price calculation could be done with the highest markup factor: Limited availability through legal prohibition.
Outdoor weed tilts the equation. It does not need much care after seeding it and I have come across "wild weed" in the EU that rivalled many indoor plants. In the growing areas in Asia it is just that: weed that has barely no value until it gets turned into hash.
Of course there will always be a market for special goodies. I would not go through the dangerous process of BHO extraction, happy to get that in a shop, and there is definitely a big market for edibles and oils for e-cigs. This is also the area to generate profits.
Professional input is always valued. Manhours of experienced growers/bakers/extractors/producers of ice-o-lator etc will be in high demand.
Lest not forget the huge medicinal potential. Tinctures, ointments etc.
As there is no practical LD for weed, you'd have to eat cartloads, regulation can only focus on quality control which will also benefit the market as this enlives competition.
But taxes, no thank you. It a just weed that fortunately cannot be patented.
-
The problem I see with the whole debate about cannabis legalization, or drug legalization in general, is that it's acknowledging that governments have a right to make something illegal and tax it in the first place which is the furthest thing from the truth in a truly free world.
-
It should be taxed at the point of sale only. I feel it's no different than people having any garden. You can grow all the tomatoes, cucumbers, etc you want and not pay any taxes on the crop unless you try to sell them. If your just consuming it there should be no taxes, government will get theirs on the stuff you may/maynot buy to assist you in growing ie tools, fertilizers, taxes on the land, etc
But just like with people growing their own organic vegetables, just because they "can" in no way means they will. At least here in the states, I assume when finally legal you'll have people growing at home but that will in no way slow down massive tax revenues that will be generated by the multitudes who have no interest in growing their own but will love going to the store and buying it from McWeed
-
well not effectively. that is true. but still something is better than nothing.
its like carrots. we can grow them but why bother when i can just go to the local market and buy some?
-
The fact that this place exists, and continues to exist despite every government in the world seething in rage over it leads me to believe that taxation is difficult to enforce anyway.
Have any of you voluntarily paid taxes to your country with your Bitcoin purchases? For the USA, IRS will happily take any voluntary tax reports you give them, after they tell you how it's your patriotic duty to pay them, that they are completely entitled to the money you give them, that the apparent voluntary nature of your donation is actually illusory, and that they will find out if you're holding anything back and shove you into prison if they do.
It is hubris and folly that the governments of the world seriously think we're going to be afraid of them.
-
While we are far from public acceptance of what is falsely categorized as "hard drugs" and this includes psychedelics, it is widely overlooked that there is a fundamental problem in taxing weed: It can't be done effectively.
As cannabis production increasingly shifts from large producers to small scale growers who nurture a few plants for their own habit and distribute to handfuls of mates there is no lever for the state concerning taxation.
If you have the choice between a pack of joints with a government tax banderole for let's say 25 dollars/euros and your own grow which you lovingly tended to a harvest; which way will you go?
I actually prefer my kids to spend their time and efforts on producing great buds that will get you the best high of all, as every puff comes with the knowledge that it was YOU or YOUR GODD FRIEND who invested his energy into it.
Once weed is legalized it comes down to the normal market forces: Quality and affordability.
There may be a grain of truth in the saying that California growers did not want it to be legalized as prices would drop by as much as 80 to 90%, eroding all profits overnight.
Price calculation could be done with the highest markup factor: Limited availability through legal prohibition.
Outdoor weed tilts the equation. It does not need much care after seeding it and I have come across "wild weed" in the EU that rivalled many indoor plants. In the growing areas in Asia it is just that: weed that has barely no value until it gets turned into hash.
Of course there will always be a market for special goodies. I would not go through the dangerous process of BHO extraction, happy to get that in a shop, and there is definitely a big market for edibles and oils for e-cigs. This is also the area to generate profits.
Professional input is always valued. Manhours of experienced growers/bakers/extractors/producers of ice-o-lator etc will be in high demand.
Lest not forget the huge medicinal potential. Tinctures, ointments etc.
As there is no practical LD for weed, you'd have to eat cartloads, regulation can only focus on quality control which will also benefit the market as this enlives competition.
But taxes, no thank you. It a just weed that fortunately cannot be patented.
Sure < every strain can be patented. And a lot are. With a r in a circle from the registered mark and the tm mark from the trademark sign. And taxes are easy too. Like tobacco just the same. You have light ""blond"" tobacco, the black tobacco. With more or less nicotine. There is no difference there.
But legalize to make it cheaper is not going to be.
If you think that weed wil just 5 or 6 times the price of cigarettes, you are wrong.
Already there is legalized medical weed.
And how much cheaper is that weed compared to the weed on the black market?
Get it?
-
In the Netherlands weed is not taxed in coffeeshops, that is because the government is not allowed, according to EU-law, to put taxes on illegal substances.
-
Your title makes me think...
The true problem with a statist society, Is taxes and prohibition.
-
The true problem with a statist society, Is taxes and prohibition.
For those with voluntaryist upbringing, taxes are abhorrent at their face. Taxes are involuntary by definition. If you doubt this is true, consider what happens when you do not pay your government taxes:
First, you receive a threatening letter from your government's tax agency.
Second, you are slapped around with a lawsuit for "tax fraud" and the threat of indefinite prison time.
Third, your home is then raided, your bank-controlled finances frozen and seized, and men with guns search your home for anything of value to pay "retroactive taxes."
If you resist, which you have every reason to do, they will shoot you, they will shoot your family, they will burn your home to the ground.
They will have no remorse, because in their minds, your money already belongs to them. You and everything you own belongs to them.
Actually taking your possessions is merely a formality, since they own you and everything you produce anyway.
I'm not going to prison, but neither do I do not accept their authority. I do not accept the validity of their taxation, nor the validity of their social contract with me or my family.
If those fuckwads challenge me, I'm going to take as many of those fucks with me as I can.
-
In the Netherlands weed is not taxed in coffeeshops, that is because the government is not allowed, according to EU-law, to put taxes on illegal substances.
Is this new?
To my knowledge coffee shops pay tax on an estimate of their revenues.
But this is information gained about a decade ago when I was in Amsterdam.
Grateful for any updates.
-
You are right.
We in the Netherlands can grow 5 plants freely for their own use. The judge will find you guilty of growing a illegal plant but will give no penalty, and starts to punish if you have 6 plants or more.
So everything the police does is wasted time, as long as you stay under your limit of 5 plants
Indeed even while we in the Netherlands evrybody, can grow our own weed, we all do buy the weed at the coffeeshop.
It is 1 maybe 2% of the weed users that grow their own weed, everybody else is simply buying at the cofeeshop.
But tax has to be payed, weed is no more difficult to tax than alcohol or tobacco
We have many different kind of taxes thst has to be paid over weed.
Only The BTW (Belasting Toegevoegde Waarde) that means tax added value is not allowed.
This has been decided by the European court of justice
You do have to pay tax over your turn over (omzetbelasting) vennootschapsbelasting (like tax for a joint cooperation) , inkomsten belasting (income tax), loonbelasting ( tax over the salary of a emloyee) and so on, in case you have made yourself a employee of your own company. And you have to pay the OZB-belasting, tax for the apartment/store.
So there will be a lot of tax left, and indeed they estimate your turn-over.
If you think you have to pay too much, it is up too you to proof otherwise.
A lot of power has the tax collector.
In the days of Robin Hood , Al Capone and now these days.
Pecunia non olet.
Death and taxes, you can always count on them!
-
Many people make their own alcohol, tax-free. But this pales in comparison to people who drink but do not make any alcohol. I think the reason so many people grow their bud is because reliable vendors are few and far between. I'm willing to bet that if weed were legalized, less than 5% of people would grow their own, and perhaps less than 1%. I have no idea, but it wouldn't be many. Most people don't have the time, patience, and gardening skills to pull it off.
-
Just because there are some people who will grow their own plants, there are lots of people who smoke weed who just don't have the time or desire to grow their own crop, even if it was legal to do so. Undoubtedly there will be plenty of shops selling all kinds of pot and it would be foolish to say they won't do a good business.
Not to mention, these people who are going to be growing weed aren't necessarily going to want to just give it out for free and would probably want in on the legal weed industry.
It would raise millions in the taxes of it and save hundreds of millions with all the money formerly being used to fight the war against it.
-
As I see it, weed would be taxed up to the point where it would be more profitable for users to either grow it themselves or buy it on the blackmarket. Taxes on cigarettes in the UK are extortionate - resulting in many smokers buying counterfeit or imported cigarettes to avoid the tax. But I've never heard of anyone growing a tobacco plant to avoid the tax. Is it actually any harder to grow than weed? Thinking about it, I'm sure it is.
I honestly think there will be fewer personal growers following legalization, simply for convenience.
-
Well think for example of McDonnald's or Keystone Light beer. They exist because so many people just don't give a shit and will eat/drink the first advertisement that pops up. Eventually it will be the same way with marijuana. There will be a huge market for commercial grade crap to tax because that's the way it is with every commodity.
-
Well think for example of McDonnald's or Keystone Light beer. They exist because so many people just don't give a shit and will eat/drink the first advertisement that pops up. Eventually it will be the same way with marijuana. There will be a huge market for commercial grade crap to tax because that's the way it is with every commodity.
BINGO! Corporations just set their model to maximum profitability.... sometimes it leads to unethical results... ie, horse meat.
-
Washington state will have a 25% tax on all legal marijuana sales, at every point of sale. For example a grower sells to a wholesaler $1000 of weed, plus $250 sales tax, a wholesaler then sells that same weed to a retailer for $2500 plus $625 to the tax man, then the retailer sells his weed for $50 an eigth plus 25% sales tax.
-
Washington state will have a 25% tax on all legal marijuana sales, at every point of sale. For example a grower sells to a wholesaler $1000 of weed, plus $250 sales tax, a wholesaler then sells that same weed to a retailer for $2500 plus $625 to the tax man, then the retailer sells his weed for $50 an eigth plus 25% sales tax.
Damn is that true? I was hoping it was only on the final customer as it should be.
-
bump
-
The problem I see with the whole debate about cannabis legalization, or drug legalization in general, is that it's acknowledging that governments have a right to make something illegal and tax it in the first place which is the furthest thing from the truth in a truly free world.
its not that they have the right, its that they have the muscle. they have more bodies and guns and money than you. they can tax you, so they do. law of the jungle man; sucks but you gotta just figure out how to deal with it or spend your life fighting it, most likely in vain.
Jesus is dead while Odin lives on....
Me? I'll just pay my taxes like a good boy, vote, and get on with enjoying my life.
LEGALIZE IT!!!!
-
I think the word legalization has two meanings.
One is the meaning in which growing, selling and consumption of marijuana is socially accepted and agents of government don't bother you.
Nobody here has a problem with that. That's kinda where we were going with this thing.
However for some people, legalization means strict market regulation by the state, taxation. On that count you'll find DPR and the vendors and myself completely set against your ideals. I've already made an entire thread on the subject in which I was repeatedly downvoted by forum posters who didn't like to hear that A: state regulations are fundamentally antithetical to free marketeers like ourselves and B: there are really good reasons you don't want a State to be involved in the production and distribution of narcotics, on both economic (inefficiency, monopolism, high prices) and social (use as a tool of suppression e.g. compulsory drug consumption) grounds. All of this has happened before in other countries. Legalization leading to the development of monopolies isn't legalization. It means it's legal to consume drugs, not for business people to manufacture and distribute them without being a government crony lobbying for such from the hugely corrupt and frankly inept pharma "industry" (a whole other rant I won't get into). Who sells you drugs, it really matters. Legalization without free market competition would be the worst of all worlds.
Besides, there is another very strange idea that pervades the legalization camp. That is that democracy has something to do with this*. That is absolutely hilarious and I laughed for ten minutes until I realized the other people talking to me were serious. If you think voting for what you want will have any effect on national drug policy whatsoever I've a bridge to sell you. Thinking this way is like thinking replacing the engine of a cruise ship has an impact on the arrangement of the deck chairs. In the short term you may have an impact, but in the long term these sorts of things are determined by self interest. The truth is that it is not in the interests of the government to legalize drugs because it's a multi-billion dollar racket. People's jobs, huge numbers of them, are predicated on drugs being illegal. Nor is it in the interests of cartels or mafias to legalize drugs, since the people manufacturing and distributing are going to be the pharmaceutical companies that bid the highest, and they won't bribe the right people with enough money unless they can ensure an absolute monopoly. We are selfish, self interested as well, the only difference is that we're willing to accept competition as a darknet market which will ultimately mean drugs will have higher quality, cheaper prices and more availability. Nothing else will work.
In order to change a market system, you must first adapt the flows of capital within it into a structure that *actually accomplishes your goals*. Bitcoin is a great example of cryptoanarchists achieving their political goals via computer code creating a system of checks and balances that produces a financial system that suits their purpose. The way some pro-legalization people talk you'd think talking about problems actually solved them. Nope. It's about the money. I don't mean that in a "oh, money is so corrupting, what a world we live in" sense, I mean it in the sense of forgetting to put in the foundation before you constructed the house sense.
So you have two real options. You can persuade a bunch of people they'll make even more money than when they had a monopoly, or a different bunch of people that they can take over a monopoly (you can give different groups of people special names if you like, I don't give a fuck, it doesn't make a material difference). Then you can hope they are really "Good Guys" and these guys achieve what you want because it's the right thing to do. Or you can go the free market route and leave it open to everybody to participate. The lazare faire route will actually achieve what you want. Let the market decide.
* Do you remember voting to criminalize drugs in the first place? In fact does anyone? No. In reality small lobby groups with outsize leverage have always decided it, since forever A.D, either religious fanatics and/or monopolists.
-
I think the word legalization has two meanings.
One is the meaning in which growing, selling and consumption of marijuana is socially accepted and agents of government don't bother you.
Nobody here has a problem with that. That's kinda where we were going with this thing.
However for some people, legalization means strict market regulation by the state, taxation. On that count you'll find DPR and the vendors and myself completely set against your ideals. I've already made an entire thread on the subject in which I was repeatedly downvoted by forum posters who didn't like to hear that A: state regulations are fundamentally antithetical to free marketeers like ourselves and B: there are really good reasons you don't want a State to be involved in the production and distribution of narcotics, on both economic (inefficiency, monopolism, high prices) and social (use as a tool of suppression e.g. compulsory drug consumption) grounds. All of this has happened before in other countries. Legalization leading to the development of monopolies isn't legalization. It means it's legal to consume drugs, not for business people to manufacture and distribute them without being a government crony lobbying for such from the hugely corrupt and frankly inept pharma "industry" (a whole other rant I won't get into). Who sells you drugs, it really matters. Legalization without free market competition would be the worst of all worlds.
Besides, there is another very strange idea that pervades the legalization camp. That is that democracy has something to do with this*. That is absolutely hilarious and I laughed for ten minutes until I realized the other people talking to me were serious. If you think voting for what you want will have any effect on national drug policy whatsoever I've a bridge to sell you. Thinking this way is like thinking replacing the engine of a cruise ship has an impact on the arrangement of the deck chairs. In the short term you may have an impact, but in the long term these sorts of things are determined by self interest. The truth is that it is not in the interests of the government to legalize drugs because it's a multi-billion dollar racket. People's jobs, huge numbers of them, are predicated on drugs being illegal. Nor is it in the interests of cartels or mafias to legalize drugs, since the people manufacturing and distributing are going to be the pharmaceutical companies that bid the highest, and they won't bribe the right people with enough money unless they can ensure an absolute monopoly. We are selfish, self interested as well, the only difference is that we're willing to accept competition as a darknet market which will ultimately mean drugs will have higher quality, cheaper prices and more availability. Nothing else will work.
In order to change a market system, you must first adapt the flows of capital within it into a structure that *actually accomplishes your goals*. Bitcoin is a great example of cryptoanarchists achieving their political goals via computer code creating a system of checks and balances that produces a financial system that suits their purpose. The way some pro-legalization people talk you'd think talking about problems actually solved them. Nope. It's about the money. I don't mean that in a "oh, money is so corrupting, what a world we live in" sense, I mean it in the sense of forgetting to put in the foundation before you constructed the house sense.
So you have two real options. You can persuade a bunch of people they'll make even more money than when they had a monopoly, or a different bunch of people that they can take over a monopoly (you can give different groups of people special names if you like, I don't give a fuck, it doesn't make a material difference). Then you can hope they are really "Good Guys" and these guys achieve what you want because it's the right thing to do. Or you can go the free market route and leave it open to everybody to participate. The lazare faire route will actually achieve what you want. Let the market decide.
* Do you remember voting to criminalize drugs in the first place? In fact does anyone? No. In reality small lobby groups with outsize leverage have always decided it, since forever A.D, either religious fanatics and/or monopolists.
Exactly true and perfect post. Might as well end the thread on that note. +1. You can only count on those in power to do one thing, and that's to be unethical and selfish. They want to keep they're perceived power by sucking up to the rich who are actually in power, but they don't actually have any say in anything.