3 Disasters That Legal Weed Didn’t Unleash—Despite the Forecasts

Happy 4/20 to the millions of people celebrating across the country; Reason staff. As someone who has never been interested in marijuana (except for one summer in college) or drugs in general, I’ve always found the day a bit strange. But as I got older (and more libertarian), I came to appreciate it as a celebration of personal freedom.

I’m not the only one who changed his mind. By 2025, 64 percent of Americans thought marijuana should be legal for both medical and recreational use (up from 31 percent in 2000). based on To Gallup. Meanwhile, 40 states legalized the medical use of marijuana; 24 this also allows for recreational use. Late last year, President Donald Trump ordered the reclassification of marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III under the Controlled Substances Act, putting it in the same category as prescription drugs such as “ketamine, anabolic steroids, and Tylenol with codeine.” explains ReasonJacob Sullum.

Prohibitionists warned that legalization would lead to dire consequences. Here are some of the predictions that have not yet come true.

Douglas County Sheriff David Weaver before the 2012 vote on Amendment 64, which made Colorado the first state to legalize recreational marijuana warned He said voters should anticipate “many harmful consequences” if the measure passes, including “more crime.”

According to a policy summary From the Reason Foundation (which publishes this journal) “the literature covering the relationship between marijuana use and violence appears largely inconclusive.” While research “suggests that marijuana use in general is associated with an increase in violent behavior,” the authors write that correlation is not causation and many studies suggest otherwise.

Following the legalization of recreational marijuana in Colorado, Washington, and Oregon, homicide rates in those states remained well below the national average (although these rates have increased during the COVID-19 pandemic, reflecting the national trend). The authors of the Reason Foundation report found that “the legalization of both recreational and medical marijuana” from 1999 to 2022 “was associated with declines in the homicide rate.” 2013 report Researchers from the RAND Center for Drug Policy Research likewise found “little support for a concurrent, causal relationship.” [marijuana] use and or violent or property crime.”

But prohibitionists stand by their predictions. In March, Ohio House Speaker Matt Huffman (R-Lima) defended proposed limits on THC content in the state, saying: saying He said legalization in Ohio led to “more marijuana being available in the community,” leading to “more crime.”

Sheriff Weaver also warned that legalization would lead to “more kids using marijuana.” This fear was also exaggerated.

Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, in 2022. noted “In the United States, the legalization of marijuana by some states has not been associated with increases in adolescent marijuana use.” Drug use among youth across the country has been reported to have been declining for several years. National Institutes of Health in 2024 to create “Substance use among adolescents remains steady at low levels for the fourth year in a row.” Volkow called these results “unprecedented” and implored the scientific community to continue investigating “factors that contribute to reduced risk of substance use.”

a reason it could be Let it be legalization. The Cannabis Policy Project, which brings together the results of government surveys to create Teen marijuana use in the past month has fallen in most states where recreational use is legal. In Michigan, for example, 17 percent of high school students reported using marijuana in the past month in 2023, up from 24 percent in 2017. In Virginia, the rate dropped from 17 percent in 2019 to 9.5 percent in 2023.

There may be several reasons why teens smoke less marijuana; increased usage about other drugs – one thing is certain: Marijuana legalization did not create a generation of stoners.

There were also widespread predictions that legalization would increase traffic accidents. The data on this subject are certainly mixed and inconclusive.

In 2021, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) published a report. to work It found that traffic accidents increased by 7 percent in legalized states following legalization. The same study also concluded that traffic fatality rates did not increase by a statistically significant amount and that “state-licensed recreational sales had no significant impact on injury rates.” ReasonJacob Sullum reported In that case. Same year, IIHS to create Drivers who used only marijuana were found to be no more likely to have a car accident than drivers who did not use the drug.

Mixed results like these are not uncommon. As Reason Foundation researchers concluded white paper: “There are few convincing conclusions to be drawn regarding the risk of death in traffic accidents from marijuana legalization….Consequently, no clear-cut or unambiguous patterns regarding marijuana legalization have emerged in the data or research to this point.”

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