How do we make sense of the drug trade from a sociological and historical perspective?

This might give you a clue: did you know that 85% of all U.S. currency has cocaine residue on it?

This came out of a case in my city, where a Federal Judge asked the Justice Department to run this evaluation of drug residue on U. S. currency.

It is frightening. People used to stick with alcohol and that is legal and relatively cheap so there was not the amount of crime involved in the manufacture, procurement and distribution. I have read where only the poor are caught and prosecuted for drug related crimes. I suppose the wealthy can buy and pay for safely so less chances of being caught.

What I wonder is why so many more people today (at least I think there are more today) have the need to numb themselves to their existence. It seems as if life is easier today than 100 years ago????

this is all primarily from a US perspective, I’m not sure about elsewhere

In the past there wasn’t a “war on drugs” that made it such a profitable illegal business. Even if it’s profitable only for a short time.

The harder it is to get drugs to market, the higher the prices when they get there.

So now gangs can completely fund whatever they need through selling drugs, make a huge amount of money in a short period of time, live an upscale lifestyle that seems otherwise unattainable, and then eventually either go to jail, die young, or in a few cases possibly convert those funds to something more legitimate.

At some point everyone looks around them and asks themselves if they want to live like their neighbors. If you’re poor, and would rather die than stay poor, selling drugs is an easy way to increase your income. Especially when other methods seem unattainable.

So I think drugs are primarily sold by the poor. My guess would be users may be skewed slightly towards the poor as well, but more towards the young of all economic backgrounds. I don’t know if industrialized nations necessarily use more drugs, but they definitely pay more for them so they’re more desirable markets. Would you rather sell your cocaine to farmers in Columbia or take it to the US for 100 times more?

If you made all drugs legal tomorrow, you’d move the money for drugs that don’t kill you from gangs to business, you’d bring down prices significantly and up the number of users. Drugs would be “safer” in general both in terms of the product and distribution.

More users would mean more abusers which would tax the healthcare system further. There would probably be more traffic related deaths and deaths due to overdose. There’d probably be a lot less people in jail.

The problems in the neighborhoods you mention probably wouldn’t go away completely, there will always be gangs, but they would be less funded, less driven, and ultimately less dangerous to a large number of people.

So, to contrast now to the past: There is still the same desire from people to do drugs, but laws have made it expensive and therefor profitable which shifts the people who are most affected from the young to the poor. Laws protect the “general population” from tragic deaths while creating an extremely profitable market that can only be filled by those with little to lose.

There is no evidence that legalization of drug use causes an increase in use. Rates of alcoholism and addiction are very consistent in populations over time and over varying levels of prohibition.

But prohibition of substances does seem to attract interest, especially amongst younger people. At the same time the illegality drives up the price and profitability. Thus it seems that legalization stabilizes use, shifts the profits to taxable entities, cuts societal costs of the criminal justice system, and allows for internalization of the present external costs.

@john65pennington By the way, the large number of bills with cocaine residue is because one bill can contaminate many many stacks of bills when processed through a counting machine. See the article at Snopes.

In my opinion there are two major reasons for the apparent increase in drug use. First, the “the War on Drugs” is the prime instigator of drug violence. Thousands of people profit because of the drug war. The dealers and cartels benefit because the “war” decreases availability of drugs, raising the price. Since the price for drugs is artificially high tough and ruthless organizations muscle out local dealers.

Secondly, poor people see drug dealing as the only way out of poverty and in most cases it is. Then the poor get busted for dealing and or use and end up with jail time. They get out and have no skills and a felony record. They can’t get a job so they end up working for a drug cartel, again.

This endless circle will continue until one party drops out of this international circle jerk. Prices for drugs will drop almost instantly once the U.S. decides to end the drug war. With prices down and drugs available legally, fewer people are attracted to illegal purchase and sales.

There is a potential saving of many billions of dollars, reduced prison population, and reduced gang violence. The only problem is that lobbying organizations pay off politicians to keep up this useless waste of money and lives.

This of this like prohibition. It is impossible to prohibit drugs. Prohibition drives up the prices and give organized crime a lot of work to do.

Legalize drugs and you can take a lot of profit away. You can put it in the hands of legitimate businesses. You can tax the hell out of it, and use that money to help treat people with drug problems.

By this book and this book and read them. I had to read both of them for a history of narcotics class I took and they really did an excellent job of explaining the vastly interesting history of the sociology and historical contexts of the drug trade and whatnot.

@Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard , Thanks for the suggestions. I just knew somebody had to have addressed this subject. It is much too important not to be taken seriously.

@LostInParadise I wish I could remember enough to give you a straight answer outright. Those books are excellent, though. I really should re-read them myself. There are a lot of misconceptions about the global drug trade from ancient times to today that these books debunk. Also, I meant to say “buy” not by.