>> Of course, crime rate of illegal marijuana dropped when it was legalized.
I think this is a more important point than either you or the author realize. Yes it seems obvious, but was it worth calling marijuana users criminals in the first place? If you stop arresting all these people, and negative side effects don't increase, why were they getting arrested to begin with? Getting arrested is a huge deal and impacts your future job prospects, not to mention the short term aspects of possibly being jailed, etc. If that all happens before legalization, but not after legalization, can we really justify the seemingly arbitrary consequences in these people's lives? All other things being equal, getting a bunch of people arrested and calling them criminals is not necessarily better than leaving them be and calling them normal.
I think this is a more important point than either you or the author realize. Yes it seems obvious, but was it worth calling marijuana users criminals in the first place? If you stop arresting all these people, and negative side effects don't increase, why were they getting arrested to begin with? Getting arrested is a huge deal and impacts your future job prospects, not to mention the short term aspects of possibly being jailed, etc. If that all happens before legalization, but not after legalization, can we really justify the seemingly arbitrary consequences in these people's lives? All other things being equal, getting a bunch of people arrested and calling them criminals is not necessarily better than leaving them be and calling them normal.