Competing to Hold Drug Prices Down
As soon as specific rules can be written for the program, Ohio will begin allowing people to buy and use marijuana derivatives for medical reasons. Most reasonable people would agree that anyone with a genuine need for the substance ought to be able to get it as inexpensively as possible.
But that may not be how the program works out, because of a well-intentioned but inappropriate section of the new law.
Free competition is the key to holding prices down for quality goods and services. But the medical marijuana law signed earlier this month by Gov. John Kasich requires that 15 percent of those given state licenses to cultivate, process and sell medical marijuana must be from four minority groups — blacks, Hispanics, Asians and Native Americans. The provision is contingent on an adequate number of license applications from members of those groups.
A rather strange rationale for the limit was offered by one of the Democrat legislators who insisted it be included in the law. State Rep. Dan Ramos of Lorain told The Associated Press, “The state has been putting away little black and brown kids for selling these drugs at high rates … We wanted to be sure that businesses owned by black and brown people get the immediate opportunity to sell legally once medical marijuana becomes legal.”
If racial discrimination is occurring in drug arrests and punishments, it ought to end. Period.
But the racial set-aside for medical marijuana allows some providers to, in effect, corner the market — and set prices higher than necessary. That serves no one of any race — and probably is unconstitutional. The rule ought to be scrapped.
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