[LINK] "Germany's Bad Idea to Legalize Pot"

[rfmcdonald]

To the extent that Bloomberg's Leonid Bershidsky thinks that the specific proposal in Germany to legalize marijuana is a bad idea, I may agree with him. I don't necessarily agree with him in his implication that keeping the drug's de facto legal status is sufficient, inasmuch as this vagueness can be a problem.

Save for Dutch cities and the Christiania commune in Copenhagen, Berlin is one of the easiest European metropolis for buying marijuana. In Kreuzberg, the nightlife district, dealers approach people outside subway stations. Goerlitzer Park, also in Kreuzberg, is a major marijuana market despite a "zero tolerance policy" in effect since March 31. Locals responded to the announcement with a mass "smoke-in" attended by about 3,000 people, and to anyone visiting the park, it will seem the protest didn't end.

This defiance is a curious turn of events for Germany, where an overwhelming majority of people will wait for a traffic light to change to cross an empty street: Marijuana is illegal, except for medical use (fewer than 300 people qualify, most of them cancer patients), but it's widespread practice to flout the ban. Last year, Green Party leader Cem Oezdemir took the Ice Bucket Challenge next to a cannabis plant. He was stripped of his parliamentary immunity afterward, but has suffered no further consequences.

[. . .]

When laws are so broadly ignored, liberalization is akin to accepting reality. This, however, is Germany, and the only detailed legislative proposal -- from the Greens -- could make things worse. At 70 pages, it contains exotic proposals such as training marijuana sellers in "responsible sales" so they are only able to operate shops if they have a government certificate. The law would raise the amount for personal use to 30 grams, but it would so tightly regulate growing and sales -- and probably raise prices so steeply -- that the goal of liquidating the black market wouldn't be achieved. Medical cannabis costs about twice the black market price.

Though it's inevitable for prices to go up after legalization because of taxes, the government needs to compete effectively with the black market dealers to replace them. Germany's current policy is already so liberal that further liberalization only makes sense as a cost-saving measure and perhaps as a way to get some extra revenue. Trying to impose stricter controls on marijuana sales just won't work because Germans have already pretty much made their own laws.