Comrades,
At the Mid-Term elections back in November, the good burghers of three of the Great States of the US of A voted to decriminalise/legalise in one way or another that time-honoured cure-all - wacky tabaccy...[North Dakota voted down the concept of totally unregulated open slather], bringing to ten the number of states [plus D.C.] where it's now OK, man, to light up a lazy scoob without coming to the attention of the authorities.
But, here's an object lesson. How to lose $US145 million in just six months selling weed. Astonishing at first glance, but hey, there was no "boom!". The laws of supply and demand are pretty simple Economics 101 and the last thing the neo-capitalist wants is a saturated market. Folks forget c.sativa and c.indica is not for everyone. Surely they could've employed people who can see the unforeseen consequences? They're called policy/market analysts, aren't they...
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/03/opinion/apple-revenue-china-innovation.html
[Never mind reaching "Peak Tech", you gotta chuckle at the rather naïve reference to the kind of coolness of "rental scooters" even if they are a derivative of the rent-a-car business, when everyone who's ever been to SE Asia in the past 40 years has ridden a step-thru or gone pillion on a motorbike for a small fee, choofing some Buddah Stick along their merry way; it was happening on the Hippie Trail long long before the advent of even the most primitive of mobile phones. Strangely enough, it is still possible to live a perfectly normal life without Uber, Airbnb, Pinterest, Tinder or Spotify].
You would have thought the market for rec. gear is fairly stable with negligible demand growth, as old pot heads begin to drop off the twig, and not enough millennials taking up the bucket bong to replace them...gawd save us, even teetotallin' "start-ups" are all the rage...
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-02/inside-the-new-sobriety-start-ups-shaking-the-12-step-model/10671650
And there's no mention of the black market, which will always undercut the legal market by definition. A large proportion of otherwise law-abiding midnight tokers might be more than happy to stay with their long-time reliable supplier, for cheaper. How many people really want very expensive 100% potent Super Skunk in their mull bowl anyway, when the finest black Afghani hashish is unavailable through legit channels? There are more shysters in the legal caper anyway, trying to sell you CBD, which back in the day used to be called "old rope". Now they want you to pay an arm and a leg for the privilege of rubbing it on yr haemorrhoids while reducing yr anxiety about them at the same time.
Blaming lack of supply is a fine excuse, when just up the road in Oregon there's a major league pot glut; so many people have got into it in the ideal climate there with fanciful ideas of turning a quick buck that they have so much farmed outdoor crop they can't even sell it by the bale full. In fact, they've got truckloads of the shit they can't move at any price - it's all but given away at the fire-sale auctions. Pulling it closer to home - in certain areas of Sydney, there is a lot more money to be made in the unlawful sale of smuggled cheap Chinese cigarettes than there is in common or garden weed. And, like any of the other Fast Moving Consumer Goods [FMCG], it's perishable. Transporting the herbe superbe across state lines is strictly prohibited and while dodging the border wouldn't be hard, that's a federal offence. Profit, if any, can't be banked or moved either. Yr much better off in the sales tax game. Back to square one. "Desperate people do desperate things"...
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/may/09/how-oregon-grew-too-much-marijuana-to-sell
So what exactly is the "next big thing", Fawlty? Very good question. Landing a man on the Dark Side of the Moon? Or as Buzz Aldrin likes to say..."get yr ass to Mars!"?
Gonna start a new craze..."who knows what tomorrow's gonna bring?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KenwZYMgu28
No comments:
Post a Comment