Refracting Green

Kevin Sabet appeared at 2pm today before the House/Senate joint judiciary committee to present his anti-marijuana legalization argument (his trip and presentation were paid for by the Oregon Narcotics Enforcement Association–highly ironic considering his persistent railing against the “big marijuana lobby”).  I tried to talk to him after the presentation, but he essentially flipped me […]

Dispensaries as Wealth Extractors As the previous posts have alluded to, the majority of marijuana will be sold in the Portland metro area, while most marijuana is produced in rural Southern Oregon communities.  Critical scholars of economic development have long pointed out that rural communities are often maldeveloped by external economic forces emanating from large, neighboring cities; […]

Geographic and Demographic Constraints A $96 million market?  It sounds like a modern day gold rush to many entrepreneurs.  The size of this rush is heavily dependent upon dispensary location and medical patients’ willingness to purchase marijuana from store-fronts.  I’ve constructed some estimates on potential gross sales at the county level (using the same data from […]

Today’s post focuses on the size of the medical marijuana market in Oregon.  I do this by combining some publicly available data with proprietary information I’ve collected in the course of researching Oregon’s marijuana market structure. Market Size First, how big is the market?  To answer this, we need to know:  (1) patient count, (2) […]

HB 3460–a bill allowing medical marijuana dispensaries in Oregon–was signed into law August 14th, 2013. Draft rules are being developed by a committee of 13 individuals and the state projects that the dispensary application process will open on March 1st, 2014.  The state expects to collect enough revenue from application and compliance fees to fund […]