Colorado Generates More Annual Tax Revenue from Marijuana Sales Than Alcohol

A new report from an organization formed to disrupt drug trafficking lists a litany of negative side effects from legalized marijuana use in Colorado.

In the first year marijuana was available at retail stores in Colorado, 94 people died in crashes where a driver involved tested positive for some amount of marijuana, according to the third-annual marijuana legalization impact study released by the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area. The dispensary will offer 10 percent off all purchases on top of the repealed sales tax, and hold its weekly “Wheel Wednesday” where customers can win free prizes. In other words, alcohol likely still produces more overall tax money than pot, though the state doesn’t keep data on how much general sales tax comes from alcohol.

While 97 percent of Australian families that claim tax benefits for their offspring are vaccinated, the number of children under 7 years old who are not vaccinated because their parents are objectors has increased by more than 24,000 over the past decade to 39,000, the government said. Alcohol is taxed by volume, ranging from 8 cents a gallon for beer to $2.28 a gallon for liquor.

This has to do with the Taxpayers’ Bill of Rights and the fact that overall tax collections in Colorado exceeded projections in 2014. State lawmakers later chose to resurrect the marijuana taxes after a single day.

These figures do not include standard state sales taxes or any local taxes.

An accounting error in Colorado is paying off for marijuana consumers Wednesday, when a quirk in a state tax law prompts the state to suspend most taxes on recreational pot.

The taxes revert to 25 percent on Thursday. You’d have to be in total denial to say this is not related to legalizing marijuana.

He noted with regard to the fatalities that other state agencies have said one year of data is too little to draw conclusions on, and other drugs and alcohol are often involved in these fatalities.