Arguing about Drugs

Culture 11 has all sides of the argument. Of the three articles, I think David Freddoso's Keep Drugs Illegal is the most problematic. At one point, he writes: 

The mob did not disappear when alcohol became legal again. It turned to narcotics and also used violence to create competitive advantage in otherwise legitimate trades (gambling, for example). There is no reason to believe that drug legalization would have a vastly different effect today. Under legalization, today’s drug dealers will run tomorrow’s rackets in money laundering, tax-free contraband, gun-running, human trafficking, identity theft, numbers, contract killings, perhaps even conflict diamonds. There are dozens of other such enterprises, including the more pedestrian forms of violent crime, which have been eclipsed in profitability by the drug trade. In the event of legalization, we can expect a migration back toward them. It would also be foolish to believe that a black market in drugs would disappear with legalization, especially if drugs are taxed and regulated by the government.

This argument, which seems to be the foundation of his piece, is correct to a certain point. I've written that in Mexico's case, aggressively interrupting cocaine-smuggling routes would lead to a spike in other crimes (as well as increased violence as everyone fights over the scraps), because a hit man today doesn't become an insurance agent tomorrow simply because his gang's supply ran dry. I think Mexico over the past eight years has demonstrated that. 

At the same time, it's very different in the long term; a 15-year-old would-be drug runner is more likely to divert his attention to other enterprises if he knows that there is no money in running drugs. His attention may drift to running an illegal sports book--wait, no it wouldn't, because gambling on sports is also legal in Mexico. He may drift to prostitution, but then again, he may not, because being a pimp is a lot less attractive than being a cartel operator. The point is, if we narrow the criminal options, if we take away the monetary incentive to become a certain type of criminal, some of those teenagers who today want to be a Zeta will instead open up a hamburger stand, or whatever. Already formed criminals may be unresponsive to changes in government policy, but the society as a whole can change, if you are patient. 

Freddoso also mentions the profitability in the drug trade, which, from the standpoint of Mexico residents, hints at something else that greatly undermines his argument. There are of course many crimes for criminals to commit, but when said crimes allow criminal organizations to amass tens of billions of dollars, these groups become far more serious threats to the country. The mob didn't disappear after prohibition, but the reason Al Capone was more powerful than John Gotti was alcohol. Even if you don't think that the number of criminals would eventually drop with the elimination of the drug trade, their profits, and with it their capacity to menace the state, certainly would. 

One other bone:

As with alcohol, minors would find it much easier to obtain drugs if they were legal.

This may be particular to my own experience, but that wasn't true when I was underage. When I was in high school, marijuana users probably had less difficulty in scoring weed than drinkers did buying booze. (Maybe it was different for users of hard drugs, but I suspect not.) Neither group battled too much, but the ease of purchase is not a serious argument against legalization.