The way to tax pot is to tax papers instead

[jmowreader]

One of the main reasons I want pot legalized is to free up the space we're using now for pot dealers, because we're going to need it for Republicans.

It should be equally obvious that Republican sheriffs will continue to bust as many pot dealers as they can so no Republicans will fit in our jails.

We can solve the problem by creating a special rolling paper for pot with some sort of special design on it, and levying a 29-cent tax on each paper. Two cents goes to the store, two cents to the paper manufacturer, 25 cents to the government. The papers will be sold in a 60-count Dealer Pack and a 10-count Smoker Pack. You have to buy the papers for all the pot you sell, and include the correct amount of papers with each sale of pot--two papers per gram. If you're caught with pot for resale but insufficient papers for all the pot you have, you'll be charged with tax evasion--not a nice thing to be busted for. Companies that roll joints on automatic machinery will pay 25 cents tax for sufficient paper to make "one standard marijuana cigarette." (This is a joint with a half-gram of pot in it.)

You'd have to include the papers with any pot you sold, including pot destined to be smoked in a pipe or bong, pot for cooking, etc.

Obviously the design will have to be very cool.

Pot grown for personal consumption would not be subject to this tax, but if you wanted to sell your pot you would have to buy the right papers for the pot you sell.

[Motown_Johnny]

1. good luck with that, when I was 16 we went through a phase of using a pocket sized Bible for papers

we would pick a good page, with an interesting verse on it. Tear it out and use it as a rolling paper.


Taxing papers won't work. To many other ways to smoke pot than with zig-zags

[jmowreader]

16. If you grow your own weed, I have no problem with that

This is for weed that is sold--if you sell pot, you sell it with Marijuana Papers.

If you grew your own weed, I don't care if you roll it in toilet paper. We don't tax people who grow their own vegetables, and home-grown marijuana should be no different.

[MrSlayer]

2. I only smoke out of a bong.

I don't want or need papers.

[navarth]

6. can't travel with a bong, though....sorry to say

need papers for road trips.

[MrSlayer]

10. That's why they make the dugout.

They even have small portable fold away bongs.

[navarth]

21. true, but

they might bust you for having that in the car, that's all I'm saying

never drive with more than you can eat

[conscious evolution]

35. If pots legal

why the worry about having a bong in your car on road trips?

[MattBaggins]

22. What do you mean you can't take a road trip with a bong?

Just let your co pilot grab the wheel for a few seconds.

[navarth]

26. chuckle

I love DU.

[City of Mills]

36. I live near a college

I have personally witnessed a bong being emptied of its water outside of the passenger window of a moving car.

[MrPerson]

3. Tax the munchies.

[The Gunslinger]

33. Yep. Tax the "os" food group

Doritos, Fritos, Toastitos, Bravos, Cheetos

[tridim]

4. I'm with you as long as the actual Cannabis is legal

Otherwise I see loopholes just like the previous tax stamp. Who manufactures the papers?

[jmowreader]

17. Any paper manufacturer could make them

And they probably would--rolling papers would be a hot commodity in the market, if marijuana was made legal. Just print the special Marijuana Paper logo on ordinary rolling papers, add two cents per paper to the price to pay for the printing, and ship them to convenience store distributors.

[Ben10]

5. Pot

Dood, why not tax the pot growers who grow for their own use? That's tax money that's not being accounted for.....

[MrSlayer]

7. Because they aren't selling it to anyone.

No revenue there to tax.

[navarth]

8. can't do that

then you have to tax people who grow their own vegetables.

[Skink]

9. Require atleast three seperate Pizza hut/ McceyD purchses with every transaction.

Cause pot dealers always pay their taxes.

[crimsonblue]

11. dumb. just tax pot. n/t

[bertman]

12. Isn't that kinda like taxing cans instead of beer?

[jmowreader]

18. There's a reason I did it this way

Beer makers are single-source producers--if you want Budweiser, you have to get it from InBev. There aren't 500 brewery companies making Bud and selling it into the market.

OTOH, pot would be a segmented market. You'd have cottage growers--people growing a few plants in their spare bedrooms, or maybe small greenhouses. You'd have commercial operations running in multi-acre greenhouses, and there would be industrial growers on pot plantations. All that means the tax system would be very complex. Taxing papers reduces the complexity to its bare minimum; papers come from just a few companies and are sold through retailers.

[tanngrisnir3]

30. That's a pretty lousy reason. Not everyone uses papers.

Not even close to everyone.

[jmowreader]

31. Okay, consider this...

Let's say there are ten producers (or importers) of rolling papers in the United States. It might be more or less, but we'll use it. If we use rolling papers as a usable form of tax stamp, we have ten taxpayer identification numbers remitting to the federal government. One accountant could handle the burden of ten TINs fairly easily--especially since they're already remitting. Simple and efficient.

If we directly tax pot, you'd wind up with this huge bureaucracy that would cost more to administer than taxes would bring in, you'd have federal grower and dealer licensing, and all the pot would be multinational corporation ditch weed. The good weed would still be illegal--because someone didn't want to pony up $50,000/year for a license to grow five acres of marijuana. As opposed to just having anyone selling pot put two of these special papers per gram of marijuana in the bag with the product, which would enable people to open pot stores without much more trouble than they go through to open cigarette stores or beer stores.

[MattBaggins]

23. No it's more like making state approved dixie cups

that you have to buy to drink your beer in.

[Canuckistanian]

13. Papers? I don' need no steekin' PAPERS

It's like trying to smell a rose through a gas mask.

[Hestia]

14. There is a Special $1.25 tax per paper purchase all thanks to Dick Gregory

in Little Rock, AR. He stirred up the city board, who were all aghast at the thought that people purchased papers for illicit drug use. Smell the horror! Dick Gregory comes to town, marching in the street all that, and convinces city board to pass the tax. No thanks, already got the Joker T-shirt for that fubar.

[riverdeep]

15. Is this an example of really dry humour?

Because it almost seems like you're serious.

Anyway, joints are fine for going out an about, but a vaporizer is best if you're using at home. Less damaging to your lungs.

[jmowreader]

19. No, it's not an example of really dry humour

No one said you had to USE the papers. If you sell a gram of pot to someone, you put two taxed papers in the bag with it and call it good. If someone wants to use the pot in spaghetti sauce, she throws the papers away. Think of them as tax stamps instead of just "rolling papers."

[MattBaggins]

24. An english muffin cut in half

with some pizza sauce, special "oregano" and cheese is even less damaging to your lungs.

[Baikonour]

20. Require licenses to grow. Tax the licenses.

It's really that simple.

[MattBaggins]

25. You have no sense of government

License to grow
Tax to grow
License for distribution
Tax for distribution
License to Sell
Tax the sale

[Bolo Boffin]

27. One flaw in the plan

What's to stop you from smoking your pot in a bong, and then reusing the papers for your next buy? I'm sure the dealer would give you a discount if you've got your own papers (and you've got the Smoker Pack concept already).

I think the way tobacco is taxed would be fine for this. You buy a pack of joints, the tax is included in the price. You grow and roll your own (weed or tobacco), you don't get taxed. You get caught selling without paying the tax, you're fined and/or put in jail -- but as a white collar criminal.

[jmowreader]

38. The papers are the tax stamps, but you can use them to consume the pot

That's where I think everyone is getting sidetracked: The pot is being taxed, but the tax stamps are going to be printed on rolling papers, which you can use as such. Zig-Zag or whoever pays the tax at point of manufacture, then passes it on to the store and eventually to the customer.

What I'm really trying to do is to get away from having a billion Federal Marijuana Dealer accounts, and narrow it down to the barest minimum possible. We're trying to smoke the country out of the Second Great Depression, and you can't get there if you're taxing pot at 50 cents per gram but spending 48 cents per gram to administer the tax system.

[Tyler Generation]

28. Ummm, ever hear of glass pipes???

[Divine Discontent]

29. hmmm interesting idea, they could do that with other ideas mentioned. eom

[lies and propaganda]

32. i prefer bongs, man...

or my vaporizer dude.

[ThomWV]

34. I'm going to buy stock in companies that make Bongs.

[Forkboy]

37. We should tax toilet paper and nothing else.

If anyone wants to go their life without wiping their ass we can let them go tax-free...while we get them treatment. :)