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Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention And Control Act Of 1970

2778 Words12 Pages

Introduction Drugs (legal and illegal) have been a part of the human experience all around the world. About a century ago, the United States declared a war on drugs, trying to control production, distribution, and consumption of illegal substances. According to CQ Research, “an estimated 22 million Americans are dependent on or abusing drugs or alcohol, at huge costs to society. Deaths from overdoses due to heroin and other opioids, including the prescription painkillers OxyContin and Vicodin, are on the rise, with many parts of the country fighting what U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has called a public health crisis” (Chronology, pg. 1). As a result of these disturbing statistics, the United States was forced to intervene and put …show more content…

This results in economic consequences such as crowding out, which is when government spending encroaches the public sector, monopoly, and public goods. The social consequence as a result of government failure is institutional change and politicization of economic and social norms. In the case of my policy, I believe that government failure best fits the policy problem which helped develop and create the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970. This act was necessary in order to control the government failure of regulating substances and to prevent American citizens from illegally abusing and distributing these drugs. According to Michael Gabay, “the goal of the Controlled Substance Act is to improve the manufacturing, importation and exportation, distribution, and dispensing of controlled substances…Controlled substances are generally defined as medications that are considered easily abusable” (Gabay, pg. …show more content…

The federal law ignores the fact that some illegal controlled substances are used for medicinal purposes, yet listed under schedule I. Also, research shows that some businesses have been negatively impacted by the installation of these policies, like Kentucky hemp farmers, and thus naturally another part of business positively impacted. Another weakness is the toll on spending that it has on the government. Immense amounts of tax dollars are spent on convictions and prisons that result from some of these drug policies incarcerations. Then you have the fact that some controlled substances could be potentially taxed if deemed legal, and the profit of the taxation put to efficient spending on healthcare or

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