The newest Gallup Poll confirms that support for legalization continues to increase. Findings now confirm that 66% of Americans now support legalization.
The support continues to increase year over year, especially among older voters, Gallup confirms. Support for legalization has spiked considerably in several key demographics over the past year. For example, there has been a nine-point increase among older Americans, with 59 percent of those aged 55 and over now saying it is time to end marijuana's criminalization.
Part of this is due to changing beliefs and a perception that the older view is no longer a popular one.
The other part of it is that the demographics of just exactly who is being measured in the "55 and older" crowd is changing, too. The age group only appears to be static. It isn't. The identity of who it is measuring is changing every year.
If you are 55 now in the United States, you graduated high school in 1980-81. Demographically speaking, the incidence of marijuana use as a teenager in the United States was never higher until very recently than it was for the class of 1979-80. That trend continues until the mid-80s, when it starts to decrease again for a time.
Conversely, members of the Greatest Generation and the Silent Generation -- who have opposed legalization and whose personal experience with cannabis is less than one-in-ten -- are no longer being picked up in the annual Gallup poll. That's for the very good reason that they are now dead.
Every year, those who are opposed to legalization keep dying in massive numbers. Every year, those who are supportive of legalization keep getting older and, surprise surprise, aren't dying in large numbers -- for the good reason that they probably have another 20-25 or so years left in them. The ones who support legalization in large numbers are in their early to mid-50s (and younger), while those who oppose it most strenuously are north of 65.
Even the party breakdown is not that significant anymore. Legalization has majority support from voters supporting all parties. Likely voter profiles still make this a dicey affair in Red States -- because seniors are more likely to vote in larger numbers than those who are younger -- but even that opposing majority will totally vanish by ~2022, if not sooner.
At a super-majority of support now virtually across the entire nation, there is no reason to believe that what the demographics have pointed to will not arrive sometime between now and 2024: Legalization at the US Federal level.
The perspective on this issue from 2009 is in the link in my sig. It has already proved to be true in a swath of US states as well as, last week, in Canada at a national level.
The Moral of the Story?
Legalization is coming -- and that demographic train cannot be stopped. I know that makes some black market growers very uneasy on this site. Whatever the case -- and whatever your view -- it doesn't really matter one tinker's damn.
You cannot stop it. Nobody can.
The support continues to increase year over year, especially among older voters, Gallup confirms. Support for legalization has spiked considerably in several key demographics over the past year. For example, there has been a nine-point increase among older Americans, with 59 percent of those aged 55 and over now saying it is time to end marijuana's criminalization.
Part of this is due to changing beliefs and a perception that the older view is no longer a popular one.
The other part of it is that the demographics of just exactly who is being measured in the "55 and older" crowd is changing, too. The age group only appears to be static. It isn't. The identity of who it is measuring is changing every year.
If you are 55 now in the United States, you graduated high school in 1980-81. Demographically speaking, the incidence of marijuana use as a teenager in the United States was never higher until very recently than it was for the class of 1979-80. That trend continues until the mid-80s, when it starts to decrease again for a time.
Conversely, members of the Greatest Generation and the Silent Generation -- who have opposed legalization and whose personal experience with cannabis is less than one-in-ten -- are no longer being picked up in the annual Gallup poll. That's for the very good reason that they are now dead.
Every year, those who are opposed to legalization keep dying in massive numbers. Every year, those who are supportive of legalization keep getting older and, surprise surprise, aren't dying in large numbers -- for the good reason that they probably have another 20-25 or so years left in them. The ones who support legalization in large numbers are in their early to mid-50s (and younger), while those who oppose it most strenuously are north of 65.
Even the party breakdown is not that significant anymore. Legalization has majority support from voters supporting all parties. Likely voter profiles still make this a dicey affair in Red States -- because seniors are more likely to vote in larger numbers than those who are younger -- but even that opposing majority will totally vanish by ~2022, if not sooner.
At a super-majority of support now virtually across the entire nation, there is no reason to believe that what the demographics have pointed to will not arrive sometime between now and 2024: Legalization at the US Federal level.
The perspective on this issue from 2009 is in the link in my sig. It has already proved to be true in a swath of US states as well as, last week, in Canada at a national level.
The Moral of the Story?
Legalization is coming -- and that demographic train cannot be stopped. I know that makes some black market growers very uneasy on this site. Whatever the case -- and whatever your view -- it doesn't really matter one tinker's damn.
You cannot stop it. Nobody can.