A significant amount of the United States population admits to illegally using marijuana. Many people have found that using medical marijuana, where it is legal, has had nothing but positive results. I have seen many people young and old using marijuana for recreational use in the last four to five years of my life. In my past experiences with marijuana and marijuana users, I have realized that a very large amount of people habitually smoke marijuana. While being around people who use this drug and occasionally using it myself, I have seen both positive and negative effects. Although marijuana may cause health problems and impair a person's judgment, this illegal narcotic may also have many positive effects on economy and our population.
             The controversy with marijuana all revolves around the proposed legalization of the drug. While there is a large amount of the population who is strongly against the idea, the number of people who are in favor are growing every day. Politicians, mainly democrats and liberals are beginning to take the "stoner's" side. The governor of New Mexico, Gary Johnson, has made it very clear that he is in favor of legalizing the drug, and also that he was once a weed smoker himself (Duhigg, 14). Not only does this raise questions about how our country is currently viewing marijuana, but also how legalizing this drug may completely overturn the prohibition on this billion-dollar industry.
             The United States government is currently spending almost $40 billion dollars annually on the prevention of drugs in our country (Becker, 32). Once legalized, the government will be able to tax the sales; therefore, making more money to help our struggling and nearly war torn economy. Estimates place the world market value of illegal drugs at several hundred billions of dollars. This puts drugs in the same league as the markets for cigarettes and alcohol (Becker, 33). Our economy would be maki...