The Meaning of Marijuana
The New Jersey State Policy Lab at Rutgers has released a report about the effects of marijuana use on health, education, and law enforcement. The report measures the impact of legalization and identifies disparities among different communities. “This analysis is critical to New Jersey, setting a model similar to other states in recognizing that all people in the state are not the same, and by legalizing cannabis, its impact on different communities is going to vary,” says Charles Menifield, the study’s principal investigator and dean of the School of Public Affairs and Administration. The study uses secondary data to provide a snapshot of present-day usage and law enforcement measures across age, race, and gender lines. It also gauges youth attitudes about marijuana as well as medical and behavioral health factors that could be affected by legalization.