Legal Marijuana + Tax

Looking at the news on cnn.com and nytimes.com this week, i couldn't help but notice the lengths states are going to in order to boost the economy and be more successful. A story that caught my eye, for example, were the eliminating of the death penalty in Maryland to cut costs. The article says that to cut down criminal justice costs the repeal of the death penalty is a good idea, however, critics of this action say, "At a time when police departments are being scaled down to save money, the role of the death penalty in deterring certain crimes is more important than ever." I thought it was incredibly interesting that this method of cutting costs would be put into effect. Would eliminating the death penalty increase crime in Maryland? Would it stay the same? I guess we won't know until Maryland puts this into effect. In times of poverty and crisis such as these, people are jobless and cutting back on expenses significantly. I did not ever consider, until this article, that states would be inclined to do so as well. The other article I read talked about California considering legalizing and taxing marijuana to boost the economy and bring in money. In doing this, California as a state would have legal costs cut by almost a billion dollars a year and an approximate 1.3 billion dollars would be brought in off the tax. I found this method of improving the economy to be very "out there" and new, but in watching the news clip, I think it could work. It is so interesting what great lengths we as individual states will go to when there is so much poverty and problems. In times of crisis like this with no sight of improvement, society has to act. This sure is an action, and if California decides to enforce it, there could be good effects, but in return, possibly detrimental effects to the health of society and overuse, which is what drug policy advisors have advocated. There are so many measures and extremes, not limited to these two articles, that states and the government have attempted to regain strength. But will these relatively new ideas really help the economy and society in the end?