We are ~314 million and Switzerland ~8 million. So if we scale the 50K Swiss figure up we would be at about 1.96 million drug arrests in the U.S. But I don't think the Swiss make arrests for marijuana possession, just trafficking, whereas in the U.S., drug arrests for using pot are going to dominate the statistics -- so we have to separate those out somehow.
from:
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles...one-marijuana-arrest-every-42-seconds-in-2012
i found this:
Data released Monday by the Federal Bureau of Investigation show there were an estimated 1,552,432 arrests for drug-related crimes in 2012 â a slight uptick from the 1,531,251 drug arrests in 2011. Marijuana offenses accounted for 48.3 percent of all drug arrests, a slight reduction from 49.5 percent in 2011, which itself was the highest rate since before 1995.
Most marijuana-related arrests were for possession of the drug. By mere possession, there was one marijuana arrest every 48 seconds in 2012. Including arrests for distribution, there was a pot-related arrest every 42 seconds, the same interval as in 2011.
So if we take .483 x 1.55 x 10<sup>6</sup> from 1.55 x 10<sup>6</sup> we get only 806K arrests for other than pot, or 806K/(314 x 10<sup>6</sup>) = 0.00257 per capita, i.e., 2.6 arrests for other than pot possession (OTP) per thousand. That seems pretty low in comparison with the Swiss per capita number of 50K/(8 x 10<sup>6</sup>) = 0.00625, i.e, 6 arrests per thousand for OTP (assumed).
Looks like either Swiss are arresting for pot possession (I don't think they do) or they have a lot more hard drug users per capita, or they are very efficient at making arrests. Something doesn't seem right. Maybe someone can check this data out from other sources. (Maybe the clue is in the FBI word "estimated".)
So if these numbers are to be believed, than Switzerland has a greater per capita OTP drug use rate, but yet a far far lower crime rate than the U.S. If that is really true, then we need to figure out exactly what they are doing and copy it to the "T".
(will someone please check my arithmetic!)
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N.B. I got the 50K figure for drug possession arrests in Switzerland from gwb-trading's post above and I am assuming that the Swiss do not arrest for smaller quantities of marijuana possession.
from:
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles...one-marijuana-arrest-every-42-seconds-in-2012
i found this:
Data released Monday by the Federal Bureau of Investigation show there were an estimated 1,552,432 arrests for drug-related crimes in 2012 â a slight uptick from the 1,531,251 drug arrests in 2011. Marijuana offenses accounted for 48.3 percent of all drug arrests, a slight reduction from 49.5 percent in 2011, which itself was the highest rate since before 1995.
Most marijuana-related arrests were for possession of the drug. By mere possession, there was one marijuana arrest every 48 seconds in 2012. Including arrests for distribution, there was a pot-related arrest every 42 seconds, the same interval as in 2011.
So if we take .483 x 1.55 x 10<sup>6</sup> from 1.55 x 10<sup>6</sup> we get only 806K arrests for other than pot, or 806K/(314 x 10<sup>6</sup>) = 0.00257 per capita, i.e., 2.6 arrests for other than pot possession (OTP) per thousand. That seems pretty low in comparison with the Swiss per capita number of 50K/(8 x 10<sup>6</sup>) = 0.00625, i.e, 6 arrests per thousand for OTP (assumed).
Looks like either Swiss are arresting for pot possession (I don't think they do) or they have a lot more hard drug users per capita, or they are very efficient at making arrests. Something doesn't seem right. Maybe someone can check this data out from other sources. (Maybe the clue is in the FBI word "estimated".)
So if these numbers are to be believed, than Switzerland has a greater per capita OTP drug use rate, but yet a far far lower crime rate than the U.S. If that is really true, then we need to figure out exactly what they are doing and copy it to the "T".
(will someone please check my arithmetic!)
_______________
N.B. I got the 50K figure for drug possession arrests in Switzerland from gwb-trading's post above and I am assuming that the Swiss do not arrest for smaller quantities of marijuana possession.