Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Dutch cops, happy to ignore pot smokers since 1976 (but still tough on hard drugs),
measure the effectiveness of their society's drug policy in terms of harm reduction.
The hope and hunch is that people go through their drug-experimentation phase in-
nocently with pot, and then the vast majority move on in life without getting sucked into
harder, more dangerous drugs. Again, the numbers bear this out: Surveys show that more
than three times as many Americans (1.5%) report having tried heroin as Dutch people
(0.5%).
Studying how the Dutch retail marijuana is interesting. It's also helpful because learn-
ing how another society confronts a persistent problem differently than we do can help
us envision how we might deal with the same problem more effectively. I agree with my
Dutch friends, who remind me that a society has to make a choice: tolerate alternative
lifestyles… or build more prisons. The Netherlands has made its choice. We're still build-
ing more prisons. My Dutch friends needle me with the fact that the US has the world's
highest incarceration rate—nearly 10 times the Dutch rate—at an annual cost of $60 billi-
on. I also agree with New York Mayor LaGuardia. Way back in the 1930s, when it was be-
