Portland Business Journal: Who Really Pays for Oregon’s Legal Weed?
This week’s Portland Business Journal has an article called “5 Things to know about Oregon pot buyers.” The Journal wants local businesses to be prepared to adapt to newly legalized marijuana in the state. How that might impact their bottom line, especially when it takes six hours for someone to use the self checkout at the grocery store? Businesses of all kinds, related to weed or not, will attempt to cash in on legalization, so expect to see ads all around the state that only make sense at four in the morning while listening to Yes records.
Mostly the article covers demographics (1. Captain Toke is educated, 2. mostly likely male, 3. of any age, and 4. is not likely wealthy).
But the fifth take home of the story will be most troubling for a state looking to replenish the treasury with stinky, highly resinous green coin: Oregon stoners don’t buy.
They rarely pay for it.
That’s right. Only thirty-three percent of Oregonians are willing to plunk down their hard-earned ducats for the latest cross of Purple Haze and Alabama Bass Stank. Two percent are growing their own, which will only increase in a state known for micro brews and macro beards, and another two percent are opting into the barter system.
Just slightly higher than free range freak farming is “Method Unspecified (3%).” What does that even mean? Here’s the likely breakdown:
- Officer I have no idea how it got there/ It’s my friend’s. (7%)
- I don’t remember. (6%)
- I stole it from my grandparents. (36%)
- I’m at home, right, just kicking it after work, channel surfing, and “The Big Lebowski” comes on, and even though I missed the first fifteen minutes, no big, right, because I’ve seen it like a hundred times before, and I remember somebody saying that you could synch it perfectly to “Dark Side of the Moon,” so I turn that on and skip ahead to “Time” just as The Dude gets his rug pissed on, and all of a sudden, I am not shitting you, I am totally in the fucking movie. I’m The Dude, and it’s all happening to me, and four hours later I am high as fuck but swear to God, I didn’t have a single bud on me. Like it’s just in the air sometimes, you know?(51%)
Free Lunch
The most troubling statistic is that a shocking sixty percent of Oregonians are getting their Killer Green Bud for free. Which means that Oregon is just as generous and down-homey as everybody claims, or the state has the worst drug dealers.
“You wanna buy some herb?”
“Nah dude, I’m all set.”
“Ah fuck it. You know what, I need to get to my girlfriend’s to help her with tomato canning and my fixie’s tire’s blown. Take it for free.”
It might just be that Oregon is bursting with a population of those people who are better at scamming weed than any other state. Typical weed moochers include:
The Life of the Party
She’s in the middle of the room, laughing, wearing cute clothes that remind you of that Disney show you watched in grade school, and you can’t stop watching her dance to “Brown Eyed Girl” even though that song totally sucks. You and everyone else will try to smoke her out because maybe she’ll want to be your girlfriend (she won’t).
The Sad Sack
Nobody really likes the Sad Sack, but he shows up at the party and changes the music to this Dave Matthews bootleg and it gets all tense for a while so to make things better you can’t help but blaze nuggz with him: he’s sad because he’s got no weed, no job, and though you cannot rectify his employment situation or poor music choices, but you can give him weed.
The Legend
You know he’s packing. Probably high when he got here. He might even deal, at least one of your friends told you he did. He will tell you a story about when he was hitch hiking in the middle of the night in Tibet, and the super chill temple he hung out at in Bali while surfing, or he’ll casually mention that time he sparked one for Snoop Dogg. He can explain everyone’s tattoos and can make a bowl out of anything. You’ve never seen him produce any weed of his own, but you’re totally sure that he’ll be holding when you need it the most.
The Wallace Shawn
Like the character actor who’s in seemingly every movie, but you couldn’t remember his name if your championship at Bar Trivia depended on it, the Wallace Shawn swoops in as soon as the joint has been lit.
Or is it that like known rapper and stone-ologist, Wiz Khalifa, a majority of Oregon heads are on scholarship?
The bottom line, state legislators: until you convince Scammer Sam and Grow-your-own Glenda to buy seed-and-stem-riddled dime bags at state stores, your dream of perfect public schools built into the high-speed rail system will have to wait: the state coffers are way cashed.
Since the state of Oregon is not likely to make any money from the Green Rush, legislators will have to look for more creative sources of revenue, including taxes on Taco Bell, video games, and staring at walls.
