Collecting information about the prevalence of cannabis use is necessary but not sufficient for understanding the size, dynamics, and outcomes associated with cannabis markets. This paper uses two data sets describing cannabis consumption in the United States and Europe to highlight (1) differences in inferences about sub-populations based on the measure used to quantify cannabis-related activity; (2) how different measures of cannabis-related activity can be used to more accurately describe trends in cannabis usage over time; and (3) the correlation between frequency of use in the past-month and average grams consumed per use-day. Key findings: focusing on days of use instead of prevalence shows substantially greater increases in U.S. cannabis use in recent years; however, the recent increase is mostly among adults, not youth. Relatively more rapid growth in use days also occurred among the college-educated and Hispanics. Further, data from a survey conducted in seven European countries show a strong positive correlation between frequency of use and quantity consumed per day of use, suggesting consumption is even more skewed toward the minority of heavy users than is suggested by days-of-use calculations.
A 1994 RAND study, Controlling Cocaine: Supply vs. Demand Programs, drew widely cited conclusions regarding the relative cost-effectiveness of spending additional drug control moneys on treatment and various modes of enforcement. A National Research Council committee last year issued a critique of that report concluding that it was not a good basis for policymaking. Modeling is an inexact science, and there is plenty of room for experts to disagree on methods and conclusions. We feel, however, that the NRC's critique warrants a reply, for two reasons. First, it appears to rest on incomplete information regarding the RAND model. Our differences with the assessment are thus not simply a matter of varying judgment or opinion. Second, the critique was issued by a distinguished panel at the request of the Office of National Drug Control Policy. Barring objection, we fear that many in the drug policy community may tend to accept the conclusions of the panel as the "last word" on this topic. This document presents a detailed point-by-point response to the NRC panel's critique. It was prepared by Jonathan Caulkins with substantial input from James Chiesa and Susan Everingham. Reviewers were David Boyum and Peter Reuter, to whom we are all grateful for numerous comments that resulted in improvements to the text. We summarize the NRC panel's criticisms (in italics) and our responses here. • The RAND study assumes that the unit price of supplying cocaine decreases with the total quantity of cocaine supplied, whereas for conventional goods the usual assumption is of price increasing with quantity supplied. This could influence the study's conclusions about the effectiveness of enforcement policies. Though we stand behind the price-quantity relationship that we assume, we did reprogram the model to include the panel's alternative assumption and the results are substantially the same. • The RAND model uses cocaine seizures as the primary measure of supply control activity, when they alone may not accurately reflect that activity. Actually, the model considers asset seizure, arrests, imprisonment, and incarceration of cocaine-using sellers, although these are assumed to be proportional to product seizures. Rewriting the equations in terms of one of the other supply control effects would have no effect on the results. The approach taken here is consistent with our desire to test the effects of expanding average practice within each category of enforcement strategies, so that the approach would be parallel with our analysis of treatment. • The RAND study ignores the nonmonetary costs of dealer imprisonment (e.g., stigma). The model assumes that the price a dealer charges covers all costs and risks, monetary and nonmonetary (or the dealer would find some other line of work).
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