Law & Politics

Cannabis Decriminalization Does Not Increase Teen Risk Behaviors, Source: http://inapcache.boston.com/universal/site_graphics/blogs/bigpicture/marijuana_10_18/m04_05029748.jpgWe’ve all heard the spectrum of doomsday scenarios wheeled out by the anti-cannabis crowd.

“It will lead to teens dropping out of school.”

“It will create an increase in arrests among teenagers.”

And, perhaps my favorite due to the sheer physical impossibility of ODing on weed, “It will create an uptick in teen overdoses.”

California may be dragging its feet on full recreational legalization, but the Golden State has long been on the forefront of cannabis culture, consumption and legislation. On January 1st, 2011, California fully decriminalized cannabis. Full decriminalization was signed into law by then Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and it reduced the penalty for possession of up to an ounce of weed to an infraction, down from a misdemeanor. Essentially, it went from an arrestable offense to something more akin to a parking ticket.

Since decriminalization, have any of these apocalyptic divinations come to fruition? Nope. Not a single one has come true. Not only are teen arrest, dropout and overdose rates not increasing, they have actually declined since the reform passed.

“Most notable in the [data] is the drop in school dropout rates. Recent studies have suggested links between heavy marijuana use and low school completion rates. But many experts question the direction of causality in this relationship, suggesting that there could be any number of confounding factors that account for this relationship. While it’s still early in California’s decriminalization experiment, the numbers above should suggest we cast a skeptical eye on claims of plummeting academic achievement in a post-legalization world. In fact, as the report authors write: “By a variety of measures, California’s teenage behaviors actually improved dramatically after marijuana was effectively legalized — improvements that occurred more weakly or not at all among older Californians and among teenagers nationwide.”

We have to be careful not to create a false causal link here. That is, we cannot, from the data we have, claim that it is because of marijuana decriminalization that teens are doing better. It is, however, clear that decriminalization did not make the problem worse.

Your move, prohibitionists. You just keep throwing your bullshit at us and we’ll keep dismantling it and making you look like jackasses.