Why is pot illegal?

[R3RUN]

More cost statistics. This is a federal government report showing how much it costs to keep people in prison.

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/spe01.pdf

Page 25 has a table showing the amount of prisoners are in jail for drug offenses. The page before has actual numbers.

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/p06.pdf

Here's some quick math on that to get a dollar amount for the cost to hold drug offenders in US prisons. Now keep in mind this is for ALL drugs. I don't know if I can find any info on what percentage of drug inmates are there for marijuana. I also don't believe in all drugs being legal.

Ok it costs the US this amount to imprison drug offenders every year:

$5,648,910,000 (average cost per prisoner X prisoners in state facilities)

Thats just the cost to keep them in jail. Not including trials and police task forces etc. That is actually a low number because it does not include federal inmates.