Legal Pot Sales Kills Alcohol Profits

Study: Alcohol Sales Fall Following Cannabis Legalization

Authors evaluated the relationship between medical marijuana laws and retail alcohol sales for more than 2,000 US counties for the years 2006 to 2015. Alcohol sales trends in medical cannabis states were compared to sales trends in states where cannabis remained illegal. Researchers determined that counties located in medical cannabis states, on average, experienced a reduction in monthly alcohol sales of 15 percent.

Researchers concluded: “We find that marijuana and alcohol are strong substitutes. … States legalizing medical marijuana use experience significant decreases in the aggregate sale of alcohol, beer and wine. Moreover, the effects are not short-lived, with significant reductions observed up to 24 months after the passage of the law.”

Recreational weed is killing alcohol sales in legal states

America is getting a lot less alcoholic thanks to legal weed

When the results are split by alcohol type, it appears that wine takes the biggest hit with an average of 16.2 percent decrease in sales. By contrast, beer drinkers bought 13.8 percent less than they did before marijuana was legalized. When counties with medical marijuana were compared to bordering prohibition counties, they experienced 20 percent lower rates of alcohol purchases.

Although this study has yet to be published, it’s far from the first to show that alcohol and cannabis are not complimentary.

Contrary to the common belief that youth consumption would increase, the 2017 National Survey on Drug Use found that cannabis use among youth has hit a 15-year low while also reducing the number of alcohol purchases. In 2016, a look at post-legalization beer sales in Oregon, Washington, and Colorado found that sales had significantly “underperformed” after those states chose to legalize recreational marijuana.

https://herb.co/marijuana/news/legal-marijuana-alcohol-sales