@johnpowell There has been no noticeable effect with it being legal here. Except less people in jail.
Here there have been several noticeable effects. One is the tax revenue. Here in my town, they have broken ground on a new recreation center (the first in more than 40 years) using only revenues from the legal sale of cannabis.
Now the trick is to “de-stigmatize” the drug for medical professionals. This “stigma” is that of a so-called gateway drug. IMHO, the only gateway that cannabis opens for the user is the black market. If you have to go to a black-market dealer for your pot, chances are your dealer (or their supplier) has access to any number of other black market items. I actually witnessed this in the 1970’s. I knew a lot of people who used cannabis. Mostly, it was bought from a “friend of a friend”. Those same “friends” usually had access to LSD, mescaline and cocaine. They could probably have gotten heroin or prescription drugs, but nobody I knew was into those latter two. Cocaine, however, was different. When the US convinced Mexico to manipulate the market (by eliminating sources by burning and contaminating with paraquat), the retail cost went up, and it was just as easy and affordable to buy cocaine from the same “friend of a friend” you bought your weed from.
that is the gateway effect.