This is one of those “so ambiguous it’s meaningless” graphs. What exactly does “Drug addiction rate” mean? Drug addiction rate and drug use rate are two very different concepts. Someone might be addicted to a drug that he doesn’t use anymore and someone might use a drug without being addicted to it (as most marijuana users claim).
It’s obvious that whoever made the graph just used the most ambiguous stat they could find to support their preconceived beliefs.
Also, we tend to just jail our addicts instead of getting them help. Do we only consider those getting help to be addicts?
eskimonoise (#)
11 years ago
The people who justify the “war on drugs” would argue that it now takes $20B a year to keep the addiction rate around 1.5% because there are more drugs being produced.
There’s always at least 2 ways to read any set of statistics.
Comander Taco (#)
11 years ago
Why doesn’t the us use drones to take out the drug producers and dealers in central and south america? If they can target a few terrorist who in their career may kill a few americans, why can’t they target drug lords who kill hundreds of americans a year?
There are LOTS of them… and it’s an act of war. Also it would be pretty pointless. The drug cartels aren’t there because of their leaders, they’re there because of a niche that people want filled. Kill them and someone will immediately take their place.
Regardless of whose statistics you use, the “War on Drugs” has been an abject failure.
Unless you are an investor in the commercial incarceration business….
Is this accurate?
sure, why not?
This is one of those “so ambiguous it’s meaningless” graphs. What exactly does “Drug addiction rate” mean? Drug addiction rate and drug use rate are two very different concepts. Someone might be addicted to a drug that he doesn’t use anymore and someone might use a drug without being addicted to it (as most marijuana users claim).
It’s obvious that whoever made the graph just used the most ambiguous stat they could find to support their preconceived beliefs.
Also, we tend to just jail our addicts instead of getting them help. Do we only consider those getting help to be addicts?
The people who justify the “war on drugs” would argue that it now takes $20B a year to keep the addiction rate around 1.5% because there are more drugs being produced.
There’s always at least 2 ways to read any set of statistics.
Why doesn’t the us use drones to take out the drug producers and dealers in central and south america? If they can target a few terrorist who in their career may kill a few americans, why can’t they target drug lords who kill hundreds of americans a year?
There are LOTS of them… and it’s an act of war. Also it would be pretty pointless. The drug cartels aren’t there because of their leaders, they’re there because of a niche that people want filled. Kill them and someone will immediately take their place.
Regardless of whose statistics you use, the “War on Drugs” has been an abject failure.
Unless you are an investor in the commercial incarceration business….
1.5 trillion could buy awful lot of weed