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Think For Yourself

Cost of the War on Drugs

$s Billions


   Year                `89      `90      `91      `92      `93      `94
   ---------------------------------------------------------------------
 1 Stolen              148      154      160      168      176      184
 2 Incarceration        73       80       88       96      104      112
 3 Lost taxes           41       43       45       47       49       51
 4 Construction         20       21       23       25       25       25
 5 Federal War           7       10       12       13       20       25
 6 Extra Welfare        13       14       15       16       17       18
 7 Harrassment          10       11       12       13       14       15
   ---------------------------------------------------------------------
   Totals              312      333      355      378      405      430

Reagan's 8 years: $1.860 Trillion Bush's 4 years: $1.378 Trillion

Notes

  1. Value of goods stolen. These goods are later replaced at additional cost by owner or insurance.
  2. Total for additional police, judges, courtrooms, prosecutors, court costs, maintenance of jails, guards, probation personnel, and the entire police, justice and prison system required to deal with the WoD.
  3. Income taxes associated with perpetrators' lost wages.
  4. Construction of new jail and other facilities to deal with burgeoning case load.
  5. Federal WoD consists of arming and paying interdiction forces along with international efforts to stem flow of drugs.
  6. Extra welfare needed to support families of drug offenders while they are in prison.
Developed from information supplied by "Save Our Liberties" of Sunnyvale CA (415) 964-3655. 1994 figures are projections.

Ohter costs: Lost productivity of perpetrators. Cost of lives lost to drug associated crime, plus productivity and taxes associated with those lives. Does "lost taxes" include lost sales taxes from supposed legal prices of drugs?

End