[quote=davelj][quote=CognitiveDissonance]I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure, as of the past few decades, most is grown stateside. California is like a $14 billion alone.[/quote]
I’m going off memory here, but as I recall something like 60% of the Mexican drug cartels’ revenue is from marijuana, but… only a small fraction of that actually goes to California, as Californians grow a lot of their own in-state (as you point out). The larger concern for the cartels with respect to California legalizing marijuana is that CA’s pot would get exported (illegally) to other states, which would have a material impact on the cartel’s drug sales.[/quote]
Supposedly that number is not correct. Imports have been on a downward trajectory due to indoor growing technology increases over the past few decades.
http://www.rand.org/news/press/2010/10/12.html
The RAND study also finds that the often-cited claim that marijuana accounts for 60 percent of gross drug export revenues of Mexican drug trafficking organizations is not credible. RAND’s exploratory analysis on this point suggests that 15 percent to 26 percent is a more credible range. Given that California accounts for about 14 percent of the nation’s marijuana use, this suggests that if marijuana legalization in California only influences the California market, it would have a small effect on drug trafficking organizations — cutting total drug export revenues by perhaps 2 to 4 percent.
