It really is time to legalize drugs, yes, all of them

[MadHound]

17. To address your concerns

Drugs will still cost money, but by being legal, they will cost far less than they do now, even if you do put a hefty tax on them(money that can be used to fund education and treatment plans). Yes, there will be a few people who still dabble in the black market, but very few. Look at alcohol, there are few people who are brewing their own alcohol, a few thousandths of a percent. So overall, yes, the secondary crime wave will go down, extremely down.

As far as less people using drugs, again, look at our alcohol prohibition. When prohibition went into effect, the number of users went up. When it was legalized again, that number went down. It was no longer glamorous, no longer had that rebel factor, it became passe. Same thing has happened in countries that have legalized drugs. After the initial surge of novelty users, the overall number of users went down, again, due to the lack of the glamor factor.

No, all the problems won't go away, but they will be substantially reduced. And if drugs are legalized, the problems can be treated from the standpoint of a health problem, not a law enforcement problem.