Reason Magazine is discussing the problems marijuana businesses in Colorado are having paying taxes. In order to pay the taxes properly the businesses would have to break quite a few Federal laws. A commenter explains the clause in the Constitution that covers both pot prohibition and the behavior of the IRS.
WTF 7.11.14 @ 2:43PM
Or did that magically change when outright federal prohibition suddenly became constitutional?
It’s the magical FYTW clause.
Comments
11 responses to “The FYTW Clause”
Colorado isn’t the only place where so-called legalization is a farce. In Washington there is a 25% tax at the wholesale level and then another 25% tax added at the retail store. The licensing of retail stores is so expensive and restricted that only one store was able to open in Seattle, a metropolitan area of three and half million.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/washington-marijuana-shops-prep-historic-sales-24445222
Tom Sullivan had a radio show dedicated to the subject this week. The consensus from callers was that it is a “Soviet” style business model, and black market sellers love it since it allows them to increase prices.
Another interesting item is that voters in Washington recently voted to disband the state liquor licensing agency and allow regular retail sales of alcohol, which has resulted in the closing of state liquor stores. Guess who in now in charge of marijuana? Right. The state liquor board. Wouldn’t want a useless bureaucrat to lose his job.
FYTW
I’ve never seen the acronym before but I’m pretty certain I know what it stands for. So for the benefit of those CV readers that don’t know, it’s an acronym for: Fuck you. That’s why.
@Frank – The moral authoritarians love them some “sin” taxes. If they can’t stop you from doing what you want via the law, then they express their displeasure and exact their revenge in ridiculously high taxes. I’ve seen this (or something similar) posted countless times by prohibitionists who either know they’ve lost the argument or realize reform is inevitable: Legalize it and tax the shit out of it!
And certainly the high tax rates are supported by prohibitionists in the hope that it will prop up the black market so they can then claim the reforms didn’t work. And politically, there are a number of parties that have a vested interest in keeping prohibition going (prison guards, parole officers, police, prosecutors, judges, drug counselors, rehab facilities, etc.), as a dramatic drop in arrests will lead to fewer jobs in the prison industrial complex. They may feign grudging support for reforms if the high tax rates are implemented, while hoping that the high tax rates will sabotage reforms in the long run.
It’s a dirty game they play with the lives and liberties of others. It sickens me.
Jerry Pournelle once asked Newt Gingrich why it took a constitutional amendment to enact prohibition but congress feels free to pass any anti-drug law it wants? Newt’s answer “that’s different”. The perfect statist-interventionist argument for anything, left or right.
In any case-
Drugs’re bad, m’kay?
There’s no good answer to the empacted nomenklatura thugocracy. Out of the assortment of bad ones the least worst might be to pay them off. Salary, retirement benefits etc. as long as you never work in law enforcement (or government)again. Not cheap, but we are (or were) a rich nation. We can afford another parasite class. It’s less destructive than letting them run around with automatic weapons.
Randy,
That is exactly why I posted this. I realized that FYTW was not well known outside of Reason commentary.
Randy wrote:
And certainly the high tax rates are supported by prohibitionists in the hope that it will prop up the black market so they can then claim the reforms didn’t work.
Exactly right. An historical case in point, more historical cases and some analysis.
http://www.nytimes.com/1994/02/09/world/canada-cuts-cigarette-taxes-to-fight-smuggling.html
http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/smuggled-cigarettes-unteachable-politicians
3M wrote;
Jerry Pournelle once asked Newt Gingrich why it took a constitutional amendment to enact prohibition but congress feels free to pass any anti-drug law it wants? Newt’s answer “that’s different”.
I was listening to Sean Hannity because I knew that Harry Browne was scheduled to appear on the show. Harry Browne asked much the same question;
There was a 5 second pause, and Hannity responds in a coldly furious voice,
“How much pot have YOU smoked today?”
And then proceeded from there in his inimitable, patented, Catholic-sin-and-guilt fueled full-on ad hominem.
I forced myself to listen to the entire segment which consisted of Hannity asking a question and then talking over Browne’s attempt to answer. Not once did Hannity offer a substantive argument. Finally Browne hung up and Hannity said something to the effect of,
“Well I guess he couldn’t answer my questions.”
And, of course, the next caller congratulated Hannity on his cogent reasoning.
@ c andrew
Sean Hannity isn’t human, he’s a social conservative talking robot programmed to spout social conservative platitudes and bromides to all stimuli received. He is one awesome piece of engineering whereby non sequiturs are seamlessly mixed in with standard issue conservative talking points.
Damn those Japanese!
Wow!
If they can do that with an American Catholic Conservative, just imagine the verisimilitude they’d have in a production model of a Japanese Buddhist Nationalist!
[…] For further elucidation read this post. […]
I think that the Hannity replied is more of a case of how deep the propaganda surrounding the drug war has sunk itself into the culture. It’s become almost impossible to actually think about drugs rationally. We have all been fed so much that’s just wrong for so long, been indoctrinated so deeply that it’s almost impossible to think any other way than the consensus.
Jccarlton,
Thankfully the consensus has changed. Unfortunately the Republican Party (for the most part) has not.