International Business Agreements

Re: [spiers] International Business Agreements

Alex Briones wrote:

> Hi John,
>
> I would generally agree with the free market idea,
> provided the 400 billion drug business were not part
> of the NAFTA equation.
> After all, 14,000 trucks/yr is no small task to
> inspect for Cocaine and contraband - out of which - we
> inspect about 5%. Imagine what the inspection would be
> in a free market equation?
> We need to understand that Mexico does not equal
> Canada
> Thanks
> Alex

Honestly, at 5% who really cares? Lets see... using the $400 billion
figure, that means that we only intercepted $20 billion worth of drugs,
leaving the remaining $380 billion that got through. It cost us taxpayers
tens of billions to accomplish those 5% inspections! Further, out of the 5%
inspections we did, how many were actually fruitful; i.e., ended in arrests
and convictions? This is economic madness. The politicians all know it,
but because every paltry drug bust makes for good press, it is in their
interest to keep beating the "antidrug" drum. By decriminalizing drugs, we
pull the plug on the entire profit motive hierarchy, the murders, the
investigations, and the incarcerations; which are costing us all even more
$billions.

On the other hand, perhaps we should all pitch in and truly try to "win"
this war. I figure an immediate jump to a 90% federal tax rate (gov gets
90%, you keep 10%) should provide enough revenue to raise that 5% inspection
figure to as high as 40 or 50%!!!

I believe the economic benefit of the free market proposal far outweighs any
additional drug traffic it might cause. Looking at it from the drug lord's
point of view, with a potential 95% success rate even if ALL inspections
were removed distribution would only increase marginally!

Gary Phillips

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