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[Paxiecrunchle]

What should be expected, wasn't it the illegality of the of the thing that was driving up prices in the first place, what would having a high demand but a low supply?(at least to the consumer?)

[martinuzz]

Meanwhile, legalisation is really starting to affect marijuana prices in the US. Where in september 2015 growers would still get 4740 dollars on average per kilo of weed, last july prices had dropped to 3587 dollars.

The total value of legally sold weed in the US has reached 6 billion this year.

I wonder how much that has affected prices of illegal drugs in the areas where weed is legal?

That would be an interesting study, yes. I'd expect those to go up, the street dealers have to compensate their lost income somewhere.

[nenjin]

Weed prices in the illicit market have not fluctuated greatly, IMO. But it depends on where you live. Goes for a premium in cities, in smaller towns the price is more fixed.

And generally.....what I know weed costs hasn't changed with the introduction of legal weed markets. Mostly because the legal sellers can charge whatever the fuck they want, and anyone used to getting it at a cheaper price isn't suddenly going to pay 70% more for the same thing simply because it's legal.

So I don't think much has actually changed on that front. White markets have not put the black markets out of business because they're two entirely different supply chains with mixed but different customers used to different things.

[smjjames]

I meant the other illegal drugs.

[Frumple]

Eh, give it time to saturate, maybe. As you say nenj, different supply chains et al, but given enough time for the ease of one to push the other aside...

That would be an interesting study, yes. I'd expect those to go up, the street dealers have to compensate their lost income somewhere.

Be sorta' interesting to find out if that's even possible, tbh, though. In a scenario where it actually is undercutting the ground level price. Weed tends to be one of the major-ish substances income wise, far as I'm aware. I wouldn't be entirely surprised to find out trying to avoid losses to legal production (assuming it was driving down prices) by upping the price on other stuff would start pricing people out of the market, such as it is, to the extent that's possible when dealing with addictive substances.

... 'course, if it does have that kind of knock-on effect, and it hits the illicit market harder than just the loss of the marijuana income itself, well. Mission accomplished? Kinda' one of the reasons you legalize, to kneecap street distribution on more levels than jut the weed.

E: Though in other news, the FCC's apparently voting on whether or not it fucks the internet, sometime today or tomorrow? Be impressive if they don't, considering the current head's less a person and more a sock puppet worn over the industry's dick.

[Sheb]

What's the price of illegal weed in the States? Seeing the price quoted by Martinuzz, those would be well below market price for illegal weed (usually ~7 euros/gram) here.

[nenjin]

For my area, $10/g is the upper end. $5 to $7 is the low end. And it's been that way for.....probably 15 years now. Various other factors might contribute to the price I see but it hasn't really changed. But a phrase I do not hear is "I've had to raise/lower my prices because everyone is driving over to a weed legal state to buy it." And I'm like the heart of America yo, the center of interstate traffic across the US.

And talking to people in the weed legal states the story is more or less the same. They don't have to deal with the hassle of travel and possible arrest for transporting, and still, they prefer to deal in their original markets. They feel legal weed is overpriced at a minimum, overdressed at worst. So the individual market persists.

It's also possible though that rather than doing what most businesses do and pass profit losses and rising costs off to consumers, weed dealers have just been eating the difference themselves. If distributors (rather than the source) are paying less for it then they reasonably can continue to charge their customers what they were before even though they're getting it cheaper than they were 5 years ago because demand is flatter.

I meant the other illegal drugs.

I've dabbled in my fair share of things and I can tell you weed isn't a replacement good to people who habitually use other illegal substances.  Someone does not do a 8 ball of coke a month and then decide that weed is just as good and quit buying coke. So I'd predict marijuana legalization has had little to no impact on other illicit drugs on the supply or demand side. The only thing it might affect is supply because some small time dealers of illegal drugs decide it's simply safer to peddle weed than coke. But that's always been true even before marijuana legalization. So, probably little to no discernible impact.

[martinuzz]

What's the price of illegal weed in the States? Seeing the price quoted by Martinuzz, those would be well below market price for illegal weed (usually ~7 euros/gram) here.

I do suspect the price I listed is wholesale price. About 4k per k on average sounds about right. Back in my student days I had a side job in the coffeeshop. Back then, wholesale prices ranged from 2k for crap skunk to 6k for superb haze. It's risen a bit over the past 15 years since, the crap skunk now goes for about 2.5k per k wholesale, the top haze about 7k.
Retail prices are about 2 - 2.5 times that. You can buy a gram of skunk in the coffeeshop for 5 euros per gram, the haze will cost you about 14 euros per gram.

If the prices listed for the US are indeed wholesale, looks like they're about equal to the prices here.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

I'm more concerned with how the market disruption of legalization could ripple back to the cartels. Weed is responsible for a large percentage of their profits, and I'd wager that the scale of it is responsible for a lot of the way they've started openly terrorizing people in the last few decades.

The drug market is violent but there's a lot of places where organized crime is committed to keeping violence in-house. Such as in the US, for example. The way it's gone in Mexico is partially because they're moving product to the US instead of selling domestically, as well as failures by the Mexican government, but I have to wonder if legal weed would send it all crashing down so they'll act like normal gangsters instead of reavers.

[WealthyRadish]

What should be expected, wasn't it the illegality of the of the thing that was driving up prices in the first place, what would having a high demand but a low supply?(at least to the consumer?)

What constricts the supply are the numerous additional costs associated with producing/smuggling marijuana illegally (at all levels of production, transportation, distribution, etc), along with another interesting factor in that marijuana production must compete with the black market rate of profit of other goods (which is far higher than the open market rate of profit, though the money earned is less valuable and there are obviously risks).

But in areas where it is legalized, there are still major legal constrictions that add costs to and limit production, with severe limits on how much can be grown and so on (at least here in Colorado I know that's the case). If it were fully legalized and entered full industrial production, the price would drop like a rock and illegal weed wouldn't even be competitive in price at cost, let alone profitable compared to a comparable black market rate of profit. Though for one more interesting side-point, by making it legal but with major restrictions on legal production, the relaxation and difficulties of enforcement have likely made it much, much cheaper to produce and distribute illegally, so even though prices will continue to decline the illegal profits may currently be higher than ever. Edit: So for example, drug dealers and smugglers may be getting "laid off" as it becomes easier to sell illegal weed openly in places where it's partially legalized, but the cartels themselves might end up earning more than they were before (despite lower prices) as they absorb a larger cut. But this can only last while the prices stay at their current relatively astronomical levels, only possible through the legal restrictions. I.e. "we're killing good local well-paying working class drug dealing jobs, and the cartels are taking the profits!"

[smjjames]

So, yeah, it's basically still like Prohibition era (THE Prohibition era that is, the 1920's and 30's) was for alcohol. Except I don't think there were any states that actively flaunted the prohibition, given that it was enshrined in an amendment.

[Antioch]

Meanwhile, legalisation is really starting to affect marijuana prices in the US. Where in september 2015 growers would still get 4740 dollars on average per kilo of weed, last july prices had dropped to 3587 dollars.

The total value of legally sold weed in the US has reached 6 billion this year.

6 billion dollars that would have otherwise gone to organized crime.

[Lord Shonus]

Legalization is a pretty good way to deal with marijuana related problems. Not as good as a plague of marijuana weevils. but at least there's some control over it.

[MrRoboto75]

hmmmmm

[Dunamisdeos]

hmmmmm

Amusing, but the hurricane has killed something like two dozen people, so maybe in poor taste? Not to presume but we do have people from Texas here.

Twas' a sore subject in Jersey for some time after Sandy.