Americans Spent $146 Billion on Illegal Drugs in 2016
PEOPLE IN THE U.S. spent between $121 billion and $146 billion per year on cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamine from 2006 to 2016, according to a new analysis from the nonprofit RAND Corporation.
Pulling from multiple data sources, the report estimates the number of illicit drug users in the U.S., how regularly they took drugs and how much they spent to get high. The drug on which people spent the most changed over the years: In 2006, people spent the most on cocaine and the least on marijuana, but by 2016, that had reversed, researchers found. Annual spending on heroin, meanwhile, surged an estimated $12 billion in that time frame, while meth spending rose by $5 billion.
The findings help frame the nation's drug crisis beyond opioid overdose deaths. While prescription painkillers, heroin and illicit fentanyl have received much public attention and resources in recent years, deaths from meth and cocaine also have crept up, and health experts say the response from policymakers and public health agencies should shift to match the country's evolving drug use landscape.
"Obviously, we need to continue to pay really close attention to and come up with a solution to the different forms of the opioid crisis, but that doesn't mean that we can ignore methamphetamine and cocaine," says Greg Midgette, an assistant professor of criminology and criminal justice at the University of Maryland and the study's lead author.
NOTE: while this report published in 2018 is about 2016, one can only logically ascertain, that US illegal drug usage has increased.
WHY ARE SO MANY AMERICANS
DRUG ADDICTS?
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