Industry insiders say the practice of working simultaneously in the legal and illicit markets is all too commonplace, a financial reality brought on by the difficulties and costs of doing business with a product they call the most heavily regulated in America.
Today, most Americans live in states with at least some access to legal legal marijuana — 18 states have broad legal sales for those 21 and older, similar to alcohol laws, while more than two-thirds of states provide access through medicinal programs.Kristi Knoblich Palmer, co-founder of top edibles brand KIVA Confections, lamented that the migration of business into the illegal market was damaging the effort to establish a stable, consumer-friendly marketplace.
In October, California law enforcement officials announced the destruction of over 1 million illegal plants statewide but said they were finding larger illicit growing operations. In the cannabis heartland of Humboldt County, many illegal growers are moving indoors to avoid detection. Investigators are making arrests and serving search warrants every week, but with so many underground grows “we may never eliminate the illegal cultivation,” Sheriff William Honsal said in an email to the AP.
The thriving illegal markets in California, Oregon and elsewhere are a “product of the dysfunction, the lack of resources and the fact that we don’t have a national market that is regulated,” he said. California’s effort to establish itself as the preeminent player in the legal cannabis economy has never felt more imperiled, and talk is spreading of a Boston Tea Party-like rebellion against state policies. In a December letter to Newsom, about two dozen industry executives said the state was crippling the marijuana economy.
Was there ever any doubt CA would tax legal pot to the point the black market would actually expand? They never fail to fail.
So you mean states expecting cannabis sales to subsidize their poor budgeting has led to them actually creating tax burdens which limit consumers not adopting the legal process of buying it? Almost like they shouldn’t have gotten greedy-There’s $.87 tax for tobacco & 15% for weed
Of course they are. Anyone who didn’t think that would happen was lying.
Its hilarious that this article is basically people in the industry dry snitching on others for doing something they also probably do themselves. Crazy ass Whitey Bulger vibes.
It's the government that creates the black market do to over taxing!
Just knew it from the beginning
Regulations are required for a standardized product.