So it becomes technically legal, but they put so many obstacles in your way that buying illegally will hardly lose attraction. Cannabis dealers won't go out of work any time soon.
I presume it’s an attempt at stopping dealing, maybe to minors? But it feels asinine to have such a limit. Like another poster says, should this extend to a single crate of beer? One bottle of spirits? One pouch of tobacco?
Having a 5g limit just means I’m going to make more frequent trips to the shop to purchase more cannabis, just let me buy a pound and leave me to it.
That and possibly seeking out cannabis with a higher THC concentration.
NL has this same rule of no more than around 5g, I’m not 100% how much the exact limit is but it’s nearby 5g.
I smoke weed frequently (daily user).
I go through 5g in maybe two weeks.
My point is if you are going through 5g in a matter of days, you probably have a problem usage!
I really want this to be true for a lot of drugs and even other criminal activities. Not because I necessarily support these things, but because we've seen that when we don't do this, prosecutors put far more of their time and energy into going after the users because they are much easier to go after. But if we do consider these things problems, we need to go after those distributing and manufacturing. It's like trying to put out a fire by removing all things that are flammable. Sure, it can work, but you're going to have a hard time doing this if you're in the woods. Main focus should be on the fire.
saying it should be legal to have it and then go after the manufacturer instead is also treating the symptom, sucking out the smoke without addressing the fire.
With drugs I think this is a bit more apparent because there is addiction. It is well known that a common strategy is getting users hooked. Either by offering some initially for free or at a reduced price, or by increasing the addictive qualities of the product. In fact, we even see similar phenomena in the white market. Starbucks coffee has about twice as much caffeine as a standard cup[0] and this certainly creates a higher demand for their coffee. But I don't think many are aware of this.
Also consider there are different ways of "legal." Some places have "decriminalized" drugs, which would be in line with this idea. For example, the state of Oregon in the US did this. Many people portray this as legality, but it isn't. If you are found with drugs there they will still be confiscated AND you pay a $100 fine and the court will give you information about addiction treatment centers. So not really legal, but not a major criminal offense. That seems like a fair way to put pressure towards manufacturing and distribution if you don't want to just legalize possession (which would always be limited in quantities).
I also just don't buy your analogy in any way. We reduce things that have demand all the time through market regulations. Anything that is illegal to sell or produce is something that there is demand for somewhere. There's a HUGE demand for slave labor, but we've regulated that away (demand is for cheap labor, and slave labor is towards the cheapest one can get if not THE cheapest). The reason to go after manufacturers and distributors is because network effects. When you cut off a dealer you cut off all the people who got their drugs through them. Of course another dealer can take their place, but the effect is still real and far more disruptive than going after tree nodes. You are cutting off branches and the new dealer is like trying to reorganize those orphaned nodes. It's harder. The manufacturers are nodes much closer to the root and so have much greater disruption downstream. You're right that there are orphaned nodes, but it isn't uncommon for people to get off drugs after their supply runs dry. You've essentially forced them.
TLDR: focus on the choke points in a network.
[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-caf...
Much cannabis culture is not strongly commercial. People grow and share. Maybe there is something in that which software developers could learn from.
Any other commercial crop that we grow at scale is sold in the dollars per ton range. Outside of a few special cultivars there is no practical reason said drug is expensive and easily shareable for nearly free.
The main problem with most SW developers is that they never learn. That's why we have CADT, Windows 10 and 11, Android, Systemd, Wayland, UEFI etc.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-09-11/the-nethe...
(You obviously still need to manage VAT if your business exceeds 22'000€/50'000€ per year.)