Jacob Sullum On How And Why The War On Drugs Has Failed

Hat tip: Mark Perry

"The authors of a study in the online medical journal BMJ Open, led by Dan Werb of the Urban Health Research Initiative, found that heroin purity in the United States rose 60% from 2000 to 2007 (most recent year available) while heroin prices in Europe fell by 74%. This is what success looks like in the war on drugs.

“With few exceptions and despite increasing investments in enforcement-based supply reduction efforts aimed at disrupting global drug supply,” Werb and his colleagues write, “illegal drug prices have generally decreased while drug purity has generally increased since 1990. These findings suggest that expanding efforts at controlling the global illegal drug market through law enforcement are failing.” That’s because supply reduction tactics such as ripping up poppies, spraying coca crops, and intercepting marijuana shipments are doomed to fail by the economics of the black market.

Prohibition plants the seeds of its own defeat by enabling traffickers to earn a premium for undertaking the special risks involved in supplying an illegal product. That means they are highly motivated to find ways around whatever roadblocks the government throws up between them and their customers. Given all the places where drugs can be produced and all the ways they can be transported to people who want them, the idea that the government could “cut off the flow” if only it made a more determined effort is a fantasy. As critics of prohibition often point out, the government cannot keep drugs out of correctional facilities, so even turning the entire country into a prison camp would not do the trick. The most that drug warriors can hope to accomplish is to impose costs on traffickers that are high enough to raise retail prices, thereby discouraging consumption."