Despite what inaccurate or incomplete information you have acquired over the years, marijuana cannot be proven to be a gateway drug as correlation does not imply causation. Although I am a supporter of marijuana legalization I will concede that some concerns might be well-founded, like impaired driving, but marijuana being a gateway drug is not one of those concerns. Actually, even if we come to the conclusion that the "marijuana is a gateway drug" hypothesis is accurate, one could argue that legalization and regulation could prevent the possible gateway effect. Typically the gateway effect is associated with marijuana use at a young age, with legalization it would be much more difficult for children and young adults to acquire marijuana. Marijuana is readily …show more content…
Taking a chunk of the business from very violent drug cartels can do nothing but good for the American people. Legalization of marijuana would also allow our great law enforcement officers to focus on stopping the production and consumption of very harmful and addictive drugs like heroin that plague our great nation today. It has been reported that Ohio spends around $24,870 per inmate every single year while also facing massive overpopulation with the average Ohio prison being at 130% capacity. (An estimated 1/3rd of the United States prison population is serving time for non-violent drug crimes.) While Ohio is dumping money into a broken prison system and spending nearly $25,000 on every single inmate the average Ohio student is only receiving around $11,000 as an investment into their education. That seems pretty crooked. Legalizing marijuana would reduce the prison population, thus freeing up money in addition to the money that would already be made from a marijuana tax creating extra money to be spent on education and Ohio's very important