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It's Time For An Honest Conversation about Cannabis!
Taxing Marijuana
Since it's tax season, I've been thinking about the taxing of marijuana. If you haven't been living under a rock, you know by now that marijuana /cannabis offers a vast array of medicinal benefits. Yes folks marijuana really IS medicine. It's a flowering medicinal herb that offers healing and relief for a wide range of conditions including but not limited to:
Pain, Glaucoma, HIV, Cancer, AIDS, Lou Gehrig's, PTSD, Tumors, Epilepsy, Depression, Wasting Syndrome, Skin Lesions, Anorexia, Nausea, Sleep Disturbances, Diabetes, Asthma, Tourettes Syndrome, Arthritis, Parkinsons, Seizures, Lupus, IBS, Crohn's Disease, ALS, Seizures, Bone Diseases, and the list goes on.
Long story short, the marijuana plant is amazing. There are many stories from people of all walks of life, and all ages, who have a better quality of life despite being sick, and have healed serious medical conditions, or kept a medical disorder in check, thanks to marijuana.
Yet even with all the positive stories of healing, many beg to tax the sale of marijuana as it becomes accepted state by state. Most all of these same people do NOT currently pay tax on their prescription drugs. Yet the plant that offers a wider range of healing, many are so desperate to gain access to, they beg to pay a tax to get it.
Not only is marijuana / cannabis a miraculous medicinal plant, it is also a super food. When eaten fresh from the garden or juiced, marijuana is a powerhouse loaded with antioxidants, AND eating marijuana or juicing fresh un-dried marijuana does NOT get you high.
Below are the sales tax rates for each state, which as you can see for the most part do not tax prescription drugs, or food, yet people are so desperate to gain access to marijuana /cannabis and its healing potential that they are begging to be taxed. Taxes rarely if ever decrease, and certainly more often increase. The sales tax that could be generated by marijuana sales is enormous, but is this a burden we want to put on patients, and families already struggling and desperately in need of safe access? Instead of promoting the idea of raising more money from the sale of marijuana, maybe we need to stop and think where the money is most often spent. By far the largest budget goes to the U.S. Military. The same military who denies access, or referrals to soldiers suffering from injury and conditions such as PTSD, that marijuana effectively treats.
Should we rethink taxing a plant? Will the potentially enormous amount of money be spent on the ever expanding war machine, or bailing out multinational corporations while patients struggle to make ends meet and obtain affordable healthcare?
Recently an act was submitted by Democratic Congressman Polis of Colorado, proposing the repeal of prohibition, which also calls for a federal tax of $50 per ounce of marijuana. Guess where the act proposes that some of that income should be spent? Law Enforcement. Aren't we already living in a police state? Do we really need to raise more money for the federal government to expand it's already excessive over reaching power?
Alaska, Delaware, Montana, New Hampshire and Oregon do not have sales tax at the state level. Other taxes do exist in these states to help make up for the lack of an overall sales tax. For example, Alaska allows local jurisdictions to collect sales taxes, and car rental and cruise ship taxes apply to visitors.
The remaining states do collect an overall sales tax, with certain exemptions. Find the 2012 tax rates in this state-by-state breakdown:
Alabama — 4 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications
Arizona — 6.6 percent, with exemptions for prescription medications and food
Arkansas — 6 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications and a lower tax rate, 2 percent, for food
California — 7.25 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Colorado — 2.9 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Connecticut — 6.35 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
District of Columbia — 6 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
Florida — 6 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
Georgia — 4 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Hawaii — 4 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications
Idaho — 6 percent sales tax, with an exemption for prescription medications
Illinois — 6.25 percent, with a local tax of 1 percent on food as well as on prescription and over-the-counter medications
Indiana — 7 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Iowa — 6 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Kansas — 6.3 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications
Kentucky — 6 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Louisiana — 4 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Maine — 5 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Maryland — 6 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
Massachusetts — 6.25 percent, with exemptions for food, essential items and prescription medications
Michigan — 6 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Minnesota — 6.875 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
Mississippi — 7 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications
Missouri — 4.225 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications and a lower tax rate, 1.225 percent, for food
Nebraska — 5.5 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Nevada — 6.85 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
New Jersey — 7 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
New Mexico — 5.125 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
New York — 4.0 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
North Carolina — 4.75 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
North Dakota — 5 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Ohio — 5.5 percent, with some localized exemptions for food and prescription medications
Oklahoma — 4.5 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications
Pennsylvania — 6 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
Rhode Island — 7 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
South Carolina — 6 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications
South Dakota — 4 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications
Tennessee — 7 percent, with and exemption for prescription medications and a lower tax rate, 5.5 percent, for food
Texas — 6.25 percent, with exemptions for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
Utah — 5.95 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications and a lower tax rate, 1.75 percent, for food
Vermont — 6 percent, with an exemption for food as well as for prescription and over-the-counter medications
Virginia — 5 percent, with an exemption for prescription and over-the-counter medications as well as a lower tax rate, 2.5 percent, for food
Washington — 6.5 percent, with an exemption for food and prescription medications
West Virginia — 6 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications and a lower tax rate, 3 percent, for food
Wisconsin — 5 percent, with exemptions for food and prescription medications
Wyoming — 4 percent, with an exemption for prescription medications
