JCC [Druqks] I'll have a Big Mac, fries, a Coke, and a fatty-boom-batty blunt

My problem on the one hand is finding a way to make this workable. Per the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the direct monetary costs alone (not including costs related to loss of quality of life, etc) incurred by the public from alcohol-related accidents comes to $51.1 billion. By contrast, the entire revenue of Anheiser-Busch--mind you, we mean gross revenue, not profit--was only $30.95 billion. So the largest alcohol producer in the entire Earth can't even make enough to cover one part of the costs of one small segment of the total damage it does to society. What possible tax could you design that would both pay for this and keep these companies in business? And why would it be fair to design a tax that only pays for some small fraction of the actual costs?

On the other, I think that talking about tabulating costs misses something. Yes, there's a cost to public health that can be tabulated in terms of hospital bills, road repairs, and the like. But there is also a social cost in relationships made more volatile, partners more inclined to be unstable, and plans ruined. Can you really quantify the impact of this sort of thing? Charges for "pain and suffering" are often pretty vague and unsatisfying. So how do you do it fairly? Likewise, marijuana has been found to impair memory formation. I'm not aware of anyone tying this definitively to long term academic or job performance yet, but I can't imagine this sort of thing is cost free? So how do you account for the loss these people will suffer? Is it enough to simply say they "knew" what they were getting into when they started smoking?

 

Is it enough to say they knew? I'm of a mind to say yes, in that they're consenting adults and sufficient collateral material exists outlining the risks. But alcohol also has a long term memory effect, to the point at which heayy consumption (averaging out 2.5drinks/day) over a defined period means a 64 year old drinker could have the memory of a 71 year old non-drinker.

 

So what conclusion do you draw from that? I would tend to say that's another example of a point where we dropped the ball on alcohol regulations and didn't account for the full costs. Are you agreeing with that, or thinking more that, as with alcohol, it will be acceptable for individuals (with the state as a fallback) to absorb those costs?

I would also suppose that this whole discussion can be put inside a broader framework. After all, the situation is basically similar across all the vices: alcohol, drugs, gambling, prostitution. At one point, they were almost universally illegal due primarily to social mores, with secondary reinforcement from their social costs. Subsequently, cultural change has sparked a re-evaluation of each, usually with relaxed laws. But the problem of legalization is as follows. While we've become less moralistic in our public law-making, the social costs of these practices haven't actually changed. In spite of best efforts to the contrary, each industry seems to depend on destroying the lives of someone: drunks, addicts, compulsive gamblers, prostitutes. It would certainly be a deep form of paternalism to suggest that people shouldn't be able to do things that bring harm to themselves. On the other hand, though, I think it more than a bit crass to allow someone to build up a whole industry around exploiting someone's weaknesses. I feel that the people who come into hardship because of the existence of these various industries are victims in a quite meaningful sense. Socially, I think we probably owe them something, as their suffering is a cost of everyone else's mild and occasional enjoyment. But how much do we owe? And what is a fair way to see that it is paid?

 

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2014/02/philip-seymour-hoffman-and-heroin

Yes, yes, it's an Economist link. But it showed up on my FB feed and was a decent blog piece.

Tenuously linking Hoffman's death to the real meat of the piece, the blog examines how successful drug liberalisation policies have been implemented, succeeded, then scaled back for reasons linked to modern conservatism's anti-intellectual misanthropy.

Thoughts?

 

My thoughts are that you shouldn't say "fatty-boom-battty-blunt," because it makes you sound hilariously white.

 

Haven't taken a hallucinogen in over ten years...about as long as I've been posting here....weird.

Sent from my ridiculously annoying Android device.

 

I am glad I tried so hard to make a thoughtful post about this topic, given the overwhelming tide of responses that followed.

 

Since I am quoting Jay from Mallrats, your point is what exactly harps? What? That Jay is white?

Astounding.

 

I'll respond, Wocky.

Laws such as the ones referenced in the abovementioned blog, suggest that regulation leads to lower instances of abuse and usage. Heroin in the Netherlands (HUP HOLLAND!) drops to virtually nil amongst new users, and you see an ageing of the active user population (average age going from mid 30s to mid 40s). That suggests pretty strongly that you can effectively remove the "life destroying" aspect of these situations if you have the right framework in place. Where we err is that we attempt to moralise it and to legislate half measures or strong responses.

For example, Sydney's been afflicted by a wave of idiocy. Steroid fuelled, tight t-shirt wearing gym idiots are king-hitting people (I'd love to see it renamed clown hitting) and in some cases, the blow is resulting in death. The response has been to impose tight restrictions on the sale of alcohol from venues, which has had precisely no effect on incidents. Instead of addressing a social problem with violence (can we get rid of UFC now, please?) we blame booze, like the booze made them retards.

Morals in any public policy debate serves more to cloud matters than to actually help. As per the blog, conservatives are enacting petty and stupid laws (mostly because it's ideologically consistent for them to do so) that scale back liberalisation and it leads to more crime (but Jayzus is happy with them).

Question is, why are we moralising about drugs in the first place?

 

So touchy.... sheesh.

 

You could both use a fatty-boom-batty blunt.