Washington Has More Pot Than It Can Smoke

Discussion in 'Marijuana News' started by garrison68, Feb 11, 2015.

  1. #21 Messiah Decoy, Feb 14, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 14, 2015
    Versus doing what?

    Personally following where most of the money in the black market goes?

    Tell me, where does it go? And why is that better for society than the money going toward schools, health services and social programs?

    Why should I want to help the Emerald Triangle make billions and billions by buying whatever weed my dealer hands me instead of choosing from dozens of strains and edibles from a legal weed superstore that gives hundreds of millions in tax revenue to help my local community?
     
  2. The price on legal washington weed needs to come down. On average it's 15 a gram still. Why don't the regulators realize that once the final price of weed goes down overall taxe rev will go up because more people will be buying legal weed?
     
  3. Morning...Washington state issued too many grow licenses and not enough retail ones. And now there's a humongous over supply?? Well who could have known? :confused_2: Seriously ?? :laughing:
    And where does the blame go? Hmmm....well it must be those untaxed, far too unregulated, medical marijuana stores n, of course the ever present "evil" black market, funding terrorism everywhere. Of course that's the problem.
    Couldn't be that retail is charging upwards of $1200/oz ?
    I call Bull Shit!! If there's a glut driving down $ it ain't happening in Wash!
    This smells like a set up and a nice little propaganda piece fed to the media.
    Medical Marijuana in Wash state is in the state's cross hairs. The want it under retail to control and tax.
    And that, dear members, is the bottom line. Real simple.  :angry:
    H
     
  4. Great, guess that means lots of old shitty outdoor weed will inch it's way east for the next year. Love smoking stupid legal states leftovers!!


    Sent from this guy
     
  5. #25 EmeraldCream, Feb 15, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 15, 2015
     
     
    Explain how the bay area in CA has by far the largest selection and the best quality of weed arguably in the entire country if not the planet.....without a 400% tax?? The fact that we have the largest selection of the best weed out there without ANY taxation on it is mind boggling for you isn't it? How did that happen if the gov didn't tax it into being???
     
    You don't need an assholishly high taxation to have good quality/selection of weed.....that's a lie and SF is the proof. 
     
    Also if so much taxes are such a good thing then how come WA isn't blowing everyone's dick right off? How come they are buying so much CA's left overs? Why isn't their education/HC so much better than everyone else in the country? MOAR taxes automatically = better education and HC right? 
     
  6. You live close to the emerald triangle which is the biggest supplier of cannabis in North America.

    Most people aren't so lucky.
     
  7. #27 EmeraldCream, Feb 15, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 15, 2015
     
     
    But you said decent growers/breeders don't matter....and exceptionally high taxes are the only way to have a good selection of high quality weed. 
     
    Yet the entire state of California is currently living in outright point blank defiance of your claims....
     
    You claim that exceptionally high taxes levied against weed are needed to get the support of the people.....yet WA is left with 22 1/2 TONS of weed they don't know what to do with as they chief the fuck out on CA weed that doesn't have uber taxes levied against it.
     
    That doesn't sound very supportive of a 400%~ tax rate to me.....
     
    Care to explain your claims that this over the top taxation is nothing but good and positive for the cannabis industry?  
     
    And just for the record I don't live close to the emerald triangle I live all up in it.
     
  8. Well is it possible to have taxes that are so high they're counter-productive? Yes.

    But that doesn't mean all legalization with taxation and regulation is a bad idea.
     
  9. #29 EmeraldCream, Feb 15, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 15, 2015
    The only person who brought up legalization being a bad idea is YOU. 
     
    No one else in the thread ever said anything even remotely close to legalization of weed with taxation and regulation being a bad idea. If someone did please feel free to quote it and give us a post number or link b/c I missed it. 
     
    Also considering WA is buying a SIGNIFICANT amount if not MORE CA weed than WA weed......juuuuuust maybe might kinda have something to do with the price gouging tax scheme they are running scaring folks off to the competition who's got just as good for considerably less? 
     
    And considering WA growers some who have everything invested are about to get fucked for 150 million dollars just to start while the cali kids get paid through the nose.....just MAYBE the insane level of taxation has something to do with it? Just perhaps it's gone a bit over to the counter productive/negative side of the taxation scale? 
     
    Or are we still stuck at....
     
    "WEED LEGAL!!"
    [​IMG]
    ??
     
  10. Dude, your boner for CA is a little embarrassing even from way over here. SF may have some great selection of weed, but it also has some of the staunchest liberal support base you could ask for. For that matter, not every county or city in CA will allow you to grow your herb, at least outside. That's what the public support thing is about. 
     
  11. #31 EmeraldCream, Feb 15, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 15, 2015
    The only "boner" I have for CA is the one where I'm looking at it's weed market from an economic perspective and using the real world observations found to blow up some internet guiez theory that taxing a brand spanking new industry right back into the black market out of the gate is the best way for the state to be doing business. Otherwise I got a laundry list of "WTF?" beefs with the golden state. But then I think about my time living in TX and it's not so bad. 
     
    I don't think liberal support is all that bad....shit none of this would be happening if it weren't for staunch liburhul support, would be all Reagan/Nixony without them *skeevy shiver* .  And they may be lefties but they know how money is made too.....WA obviously hasn't been clued in. 
     
    There will be communities and sub developments across america that will never allow ganj farming to happen in folks yards....no matter how legal it is on a state/fed level. Hell they already ban regular farming and you need an HOA approval to do so much as an herb garden for you kitchen. The lack of support from "The Vistas" at Tera D-Bag Estates and their postage stamp sized yards is no great loss to the agricultural industry side of things. Besides if precedence is any indicator no amount of public support is going to over ride and shit on the policies of these communities. HOA's are like mafias except harder to get at.  They can be taken down, but WHOOOO you can almost bet the world it's going to be a knock down drag out fight in court for YEARS.  
     
    The point of all this was you can have a kick ass thriving pot industry and uncle sam doesn't need to come in and snatch 75% off the top for it to work. He actually makes more money taking a smaller fraction of many more translations. 
     
  12. #32 Messiah Decoy, Feb 15, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 15, 2015
    You have the nerve to imply other people are retarded when you throw around baseless, borderline conspiracy theories that WA is buying way more weed from Cali than usual.

    Where's your evidence for this? Are we supposed to assume you have ways of tracking the illegal WA-Cali drug trade?

    There's no reason for the black market to grow in WA. If anything it stayed the same considering the legal industry obviously takes some of the weed market share.

    I already told you the reason the legal growers can't get rid of the weed is there's not enough retail shops.

    There are 270 growers in WA and only 85 legal weed shops.

    It doesn't take a mathematical genius to figure out why legal growers can't get rid of their supply.

    The number of growers highly out number the amount of weed shops.

    and prices for a gram in WA have dropped since last year, so the idea that taxes won't allow the price to drop is complete bullshit. The prices have dropped and could continue to drop. Especially if weed shops can't move product.
     
  13. #33 EmeraldCream, Feb 15, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 15, 2015
     
    Look I'm not against taxing and regulating....but in WA's case man they fucked the pooch on both fronts and proved themselves complete failures at literally every single objective of legalization outside of no more prison for weed. And a large part of it has been their whole "Let's solve the worlds problems by taxing weed until it's so expensive only rich people can afford it!!" mindset without any regard to the economic/industrial/political consequences and realities of legalizing an industry with a 60+ year old deeply rooted black market/counter culture to compete with.  
     
    They thought they could wave their magic tax wand and everyone would line up to hand uncle sam money hand over fist for the privilege of doing what they already do...LOL
     
    Reality check, people vote their pocket books and right now legal weed in WA is not anywhere near the winner they thought it was going to be, they are going to have to ease the strangle hold on the industry a bit, issue more permits and ease off the taxation to a more economically friendly level. If they did that I would bet a fat stack of bennies business at the dispensaries picks the hell up.  
     

  14. So what should be the tax rate?

    Colorado has lower taxes. Would you be happy with their tax rate?
     
  15. #35 EmeraldCream, Feb 15, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 15, 2015
     
    Whatever the majority of the market is willing to pay...at least until the black market is largely dead, bare minimum. Better to start low, capture the market THEN run taxes up. That would be the best way for the state to max out it's cannabis revenue generation. 
     
    Butt....IMO they SHOULD have nothing but sales taxes, I don't see any real reason to levy special and excessive taxes against it and not every other consumable commodity. Also I personally believe the legalization of weed should not be about how big of a tax whore we can turn cannabis into, it should be about making it another mainstream agricultural product for responsible adults to openly enjoy without threat of persecution.I don't pay any special "Fix the world" insano tax rate when I buy saffron, dahlias, potatoes, basil or a dozen roses....wtf??Why cannabis?o_O?
     
    You want to charge a 400% tax rate on something to help the HC industry?  Try fast food first.....at least black market burgers for fat ass's would be amusing. 
     
    Help education? Start taxing ANY profitable economic activity conducted by churches and religious institutes. No more dodging taxes just because you made a grip in the name of your god or put your gods name on your product. Anything moving in/out of their accounts that isn't a donation used for charity/repair/upkeep needs to get hit when it moves just like everyone else. 
     
    Colorado did it better indeed....notice how the lower prices drive sales?? ITS MAGIC!!  Not really but....
     
    What I don't like about Colorado is their crony licencing style. Last I read you need a rather excessive pile of money just to get the piece of paper that says "Ok"....a very typical and crony "by the rich for the rich" thing to do. So they get the nutz and the finga as well.
     
    Here is hoping that at least one state in the union winds up not turning their legalization into a corrupt racket between the state and a couple of rich guys. 
    [​IMG]
     
    But I wouldn't hold my breath for too long....
     
  16. #36 s9p, Feb 22, 2015
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 22, 2015
    Legal weed is the best thing to happen to this Washington State pot smoker. The prices are not that bad here's a menu of the store that I visit in Spokane all these prices include tax[​IMG][​IMG]
     
  17.  
    Yes. It's something I'm concerned about here in OR where my neighbors are very tax-happy (they love to up the property taxes here, thinking it will somehow magically educate the children better).
     
    I think a lot of people will grow their own here and the tax haul won't be as good as they thought. Watch, then, poof! no more home grown for us.
     
    Even in WA they were selling for 10 a gram a few weeks ago at a shop just over the OR/WA border.
     
  18. Glut? Maybe. Come talk to me in August when me, in my non med state, cant find anything worth paying for. The greedy always cry about market fluctuation when it isnt working in their favor. Patience. Meanwhile, those who understand supply and demend are waiting patiently for things to change like they always do come summertime.

    If you, the investor, entered this market, dependant on high return, during these early stages of development, you may have made a hasty choice.
     
  19. Gosh, I hate these conversations...I am a medical mj patient on both WA and OR.  MOST people who legitimately qualify foe medical use are via "qualifying conditions" disabled, very ill (many terminally so) and as such, unless they are "trust fund babies," simply cannot afford dispensary prices.
     
    You don't need to be a statistical analysis, market source and logistics expert to see (wherever you are) the "black market" will ALWAYS respond to two basic tenets...supply versus demand...and macro economics. In LEGAL states, that use dispensaries, the prices do not reflect the financial abilities nor differentiate between recreational users (luxury items are always targeted to the most affluent demographic) while medical users, too disabled or too ill to grow the quality required, are "averaging" over 400 an ounce, and the taxes they collect have [to date] done nothing to "help" the economy.
     
    The ONLY  benefit I have seen in our new laws is in control and identification of pesticides, fungicides, mildew, mold and pathogen testing. As to finances, the higher the legal cost, the higher the clandestine cost (and higher collateral criminal offenses) but, there seems to be a ray of hope. Under the new legalization laws for Oregon, they are allowing ANYONE of age to grow 4 plants. Specifically to bring the prices DOWN, reducing the risk/reward factor in criminal enterprise. The proof will be in the pudding.
     
    Sixty bucks a GRAM for high-end medical strains? Now, stop and think for a second. You can go to vitually ANY middle-to-high school in the country and find heroin, coke and crack at ten bucks a pop, yet IF you could find cannabis it would be too expensive, and there is NO WAY TO LEGISLATE MORALITY! Kids ARE going to experiment, always have, always will...so making sure the afforable drugs that are deadly, dangerous and addicting arecheap and plentiful is MUCH better than having the SAFEST recreational substance the LEAST available, makes perfect sense.
     
    I have 2 kids and 6 grand-kids.  They were brought up to know they could ask about ANY substance they may have wanted to try, and in each instance they were educated on the real issues (pro and con) of whatever drug in question, went to support groups to hear REAL people talking about what their lives are like and out of eight progeny, only one ever even tried anything other than cannabis, and none of them got addicted, most don't even consider it, and I am VERY proud that not a one of them would drink alcohol or choose "hard" drugs over the occasional doobie. Purely based on Harm Reduction Model education.
     
    When these corporate, profiteering crews tell kids how dangerous and addicting cannabis is, and they see just the traffic fatalities from alcohol, the overdose deaths from hard drugs, and the crime these habits bring, how can we expect them to believe the "warnings" about anything?  Ah..well, nothing I am going to say will change anything. So I guess, I'll just wish you all a good night, and hope someday, everyone will be as free as we can be, quit fighting over stupidity, and find balance in our lives. WE have to be our Ambassadors for Hope, because "expecting others to do it for us," has led us to where we are now. Peace, all.
     
  20. Nice post, s9p. That menu is beautiful.
     

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