Narconomics

Reasons for legalising or decriminalising recreational drugs

Discuss each reason - how compelling do you find it?

Legalising or decriminalising recreational drugs will bring in additional tax revenue

Prohibition of drugs actually causes crime and benefits criminals

Legalising drugs would allow the state to control drug quality and access

Other, legal drugs are more harmful (alcohol, tobacco)

In a free society, people should be free to choose themselves if they want to use drugs

Recreational drugs have always been used in human societies.

Reasons for not outlawing recreational drugs

The escalation argument: one drug leads to another, and the doses rise over time. Gateway drugs: “soft” drugs are gateways into drug use that invariably lead to the consumption of stronger and more dangerous drugs.Addiction is itself dangerous, both in a medical and in a social context.The war on drugs seems (sometimes) to work better than drug legalisation. No one should be taking drugs for ethical reasons. There is a moral obligation for all people to take care of themselves and their health. Drug users are not free in their decision to take drugs or not, and must therefore be guided and protected by the state.

Some business language:

Price pressure
saturated market
customer feedback
a hike in price, price hiking
Price fixing
anti-competitive practices
franchising
rebranding
CSR
market research
human resources
means of production
labour shortage
consumer demand
distribution
to test the market
pilot scheme
downsizing
expansion
mutual interests

How might these terms apply to the illegal drug business?

If an industry pulls in $300 billion a year, it must be doing something right. And the industry investigated by the British editor for The Economist, Tom Wainwright has refined important business practices used by companies like Coca Cola and McDonalds to expand markets and maximize profit. It's the drug business, including legal highs that turned New Zealander Matt "Starboy" Bowden into a millionaire. Wainwright's new book is called Narconomics: How to Run a Drug Cartel

Jesse Mulligan interviews Tom Wainwright:


Part 1 terms


Listen here:

Narconomics


Part 1. from 1:00 - 13:00 (12 min)


1. What terminology from the business world do drug cartels use?

2. Why did Tom end up covering the drug industry in Mexico?

3. What is one of the big problems of the cartels?

4. How many people are employed by the main cartels of Central America?

5. Why is the staff turnover so high?

6. Why is difficult to recruit staff?

7. What's the solution?

____


7. Why do the cartels take PR seriously?

8. How do cartels do "branding"?

9. What's the value of branding for the cartels?

10. What creates tension between the franchiser and the franchisee?

_____

End of Part 1


14:00-24:00 (10 min)

Part 2

11. Why is limiting supply not a solution, according to Tom?

12. How is Walmart able to keep prices low?

13. What happens to the price of cocaine if you raise the price of the leaves?

_____

14. What are the two main ways of reducing demand?

15. What has happened in Colorado as a result of legalisation?

16. What are the two benefits of legally prescribing heroin to addicts?

_____

17. Who is Star Boy?

18. Why is it hard to get hold of cocaine and heroin in NZ?

19. Why is Tom interested in the approach to legal highs in NZ?

20. What is meant by playing cat and mouse?

"Smack and Cheese"

1. What is different about the product?

2. What's the connection with the idea of "smuggling"?

3. What is "mack" and what is "smack?"

Burgerfuel Narcos spoof

Discuss the comments about this ad:

1. "Latin Americans across the world already have to deal with commentary around the drug war and for many Latin Americans who come from violent areas, the drug war is quite close to us."

2.  "Following the election of US President Donald Trump - fuelled by anti-immigration sentiment, particularly targeting the Latin American and Muslim communities - such advertising could normalise some of the negative stereotypes the campaign was built on."

3. "The Latin American community is rich in diversity and has a plurality of voices. Companies should not be exploiting narrow stereotypes for profit's sake."

4. "I don't know why people think that it's funny, or even friendly, they obviously do not know the sadness and pain behind that. They ignore completely that in my country there are children without parents, parents without children because of the war."

5. "I know some people who would rather say that they are from another country instead of hearing those comments."