"Heroin would only cost 12 cents per vial if it weren't for prohibition!" Yeah man, that's not the preferred end state
Replies
That would get rid of drug dealers, it would not however get rid of drugs
jun 17, 2025, 2:45 am • 10 1 • view
It's a legitimate harm reduction argument, though. A lot of the things that mess up and/or kill heroin addicts are the things that they have to do to get the heroin, more than the heroin itself. Not that being a junkie is a good thing...
jun 17, 2025, 3:10 am • 1 0 • view
...but a junkie who doesn't have to turn tricks or steal stuff and can keep out of prison and the shit that folllows is way more likely to get clean and be okay-ish than one who can't. And price is a critical part of this.
jun 17, 2025, 3:10 am • 4 0 • view
If the logical conclusion of your framing is "We need to flood the market with heroin so that there's less economic incentive to build a drug empire" your take shouldn't pass a smell test.
jun 17, 2025, 2:46 am • 4 0 • view
"The government should sell drugs at a price a bit higher than the black market rate in a controlled setting with addiction services, yadda yadda" is a reasonable argument. This is... something else
jun 17, 2025, 2:47 am • 8 0 • view
jun 17, 2025, 2:54 am • 1 0 • view
Yes it is Drug crime is mostly driven by profit and desperation to score Take the economics out of it and the problem becomes exponentially easier to address
jun 17, 2025, 3:21 am • 0 0 • view
Take the economics out of it by creating a free competitive market place for drugs so that they are sold at marginal cost?
jun 17, 2025, 3:32 am • 0 0 • view
A system where the predatory economics and carceral violence is removed, so people can be free to find help they need without fear, and adults can make adult choices in a regulated market I know better things are hard to imagine for some people
jun 17, 2025, 3:39 am • 0 0 • view
Kinda. Lower drug prices are good *if* they come from non criminal new firms entering the market. Big negative externality of selling drugs being illegal is it gives organized crime a huge source of cash, which increases its power
jun 17, 2025, 3:36 am • 0 0 • view
Drug addiction is bad in and of itself. It's not all externalities from gangs
jun 17, 2025, 3:44 am • 0 0 • view
I agree, but IMO crime is worse. Especially organized crime. Like, this is an extreme example, but take Mexico. How many additional addicts would you consider it worth the price to have to defang the cartels?
jun 17, 2025, 3:47 am • 1 0 • view
Not as many as we would get with price equal to marginal cost
jun 17, 2025, 4:41 am • 0 0 • view
Would you manufacture it at that price? Vegetables fetch a better profit margin. Why do you think we abandoned alcohol prohibition?
jun 17, 2025, 2:47 am • 0 0 • view
If that is indeed the marginal cost, economics tells us that in a competitive market place it would end up being the market price, yes
jun 17, 2025, 2:53 am • 1 0 • view
If every would-be drug producer thought "not worth it, better to grow vegetables" then it would, in fact, be extremely worth it, because those first few vials of heroin off the assembly line would fetch a huge price
jun 17, 2025, 2:57 am • 1 0 • view
Do you seriously think you can arrest your way out of this problem?
jun 17, 2025, 2:59 am • 0 0 • view
Did you ever stop beating your wife?
jun 17, 2025, 3:03 am • 0 0 • view
Fuck you.
jun 17, 2025, 3:04 am • 0 0 • view
jun 17, 2025, 3:09 am • 0 0 • view
Jesus Christ, what’s the fucking matter with you
jun 17, 2025, 3:05 am • 0 0 • view
You’re completely out of pocket
jun 17, 2025, 3:09 am • 0 0 • view
No, I'm being normal and you're being an insufferable scold because you want to "win" this interaction
jun 17, 2025, 3:11 am • 0 0 • view
You’re an an absolute fucking freak lol
jun 17, 2025, 3:15 am • 2 0 • view
Portugal decriminalized ALL personal possession of drugs a quarter century ago in favor of a harm reduction approach. Where are the horror stories?
jun 17, 2025, 2:57 am • 0 0 • view
jun 17, 2025, 2:58 am • 1 0 • view
So doing more of the same will somehow produce a different result?
jun 17, 2025, 3:02 am • 0 0 • view
I’m literate enough to know that Switzerland legalized prescription heroin in 1994. Where is this hellscape you imagine?
jun 17, 2025, 3:10 am • 1 0 • view
Did you even read what I wrote? So what is your solution? I’ll wait.
jun 17, 2025, 3:14 am • 0 0 • view
bsky.app/profile/john...
jun 17, 2025, 3:32 am • 1 0 • view
there's a too-cute-by-half argument that many of the worst social externalities of heroin are downstream of addicts doing whatever they can to afford heroin. So, conditional on a certain # of addicts, you probably want it to be cheap? The problem ofc is the extensive-margin demand response...
jun 17, 2025, 3:26 am • 1 0 • view
This guy apparently believes that if heroin were cheap it wouldn't be worth producing anymore. My econ 101 is a little rusty but I think that one checks out lol
jun 17, 2025, 3:30 am • 1 0 • view
“This guy apparently believes” [insert random thing I just made up]
jun 17, 2025, 4:27 am • 0 0 • view
jun 17, 2025, 5:44 am • 0 0 • view