A rational, reasonable price for pot?

[bluntmassa1]

I agree that the tax bite is unpredictable. If the tax bite is too high then legalization will have no impact on the market except that you can expect the authorities to crack down MUCH harder because now black marketeers are "stealing tax money from the children".

Colorado legalized home grown weed. What does it cost to produce your own home grown weed? I would guess about $20 per pound, max.

it costs more then that if your running co2, ac or chilliers, using hydroponic nutes espeacially AN and then you have to invest in grow lights, hydroponic systems or soil and pots to grow in even organic soil amendments aint cheap. you got to replace equipment all the time so your never gonna grow a pound indoors for $20 dollars you will spend more than $20 on electricity alone to produce a pound of weed.
outdoors its possible but not if you hire help and you would need the cheapest nutes you can find. your own well would be nice too so your not paying the city for 100's of gallons a month. but even outdoors your not gonna be growing great weed for $20 a pound.

 

[NoDrama]

Smokers cost the country $96 billion a year in direct health care costs, and an additional $97 billion a year in lost productivity. There's a good reason cigarette taxes are so high.

Costs the country? I didn't realize the country had a bank account. At least it isn't costing me, i quit smoking years ago.

IF I were government I would actually try to make cigarettes cheaper, population control is a good thing these days. More Americans die from smoking in 1 month than died in all the wars of the last 20 years combined. Reduce population to 120 million people in the USA and you solve a bunch of problems along the way.

 

[tibberous]

If every single person who smokes quit today, and the Tobacco industry closed its doors, that $193B in "lost revenue" would be made up in higher taxes somewhere else

It's probably offset itself in healthcare costs of smokers - at least it would if they then didn't live another 20 years old medicare and social security.

 

[cannabineer]

OK, I will grant that trimming is a bottleneck. There are ways around that. I guarantee that Ag machinery businesses will put their very best engineers to work on automating the trimming process if there is money to be made in doing so.

Another, very simple way to minimize or eliminate the trimming costs is to simply not do it. Sell the marijuana to the retail customer untrimmed and let the smoker trim his own. This would be a terrific price point separator.

DD, a question. How many man-hours went into producing that pound of tobacco? I think the trimming aspect is key, and those $2. an hour back then are like $18. an hour today. And a shit trim job on a pound takes a day.

As for ag machinery to do the trim, I'd wait until it's in hand. Consider the TrimPro ... an expensive machine that doesn't do a job comparable to handwork. A good trimming machine might have to be a high-level robot to identify each trimmable leaflet and follow it into the bud a bit. This is what separates "machine" from "hand" trimming. It's no coincidence that "machine-rolled" cigars go for $50 to $500 a box less than the top-shelf article. cn

 

[Red1966]

I'd love to have access to one to see if there really worth the investment. Hell, if you could trim a pound in an hour they'd be worth the investment - it's not just saving days of time, it's saving days of miserable, painful work and long-term health. It's not even the trimming, it's the sitting bent-over for 12 hours a day - fucking kills your back.

True, I trim standing up with a couple large trays on a table and a "trash" bucket to the side. Really saves your back.

 

[Red1966]

Smokers cost the country $96 billion a year in direct health care costs, and an additional $97 billion a year in lost productivity. There's a good reason cigarette taxes are so high.

Tobacco taxes take in about five times that amount. The tax collector pays very little of the cost of tobacco use, insurers, consumers, and business pay the bulk of it. This is the reason they don't ban the sale of tobacco, they make a ton of money off it.

 

[UncleBuck]

i love it when someone who doesn't grow or even smoke gets on a pot website and starts to dictate what the fair price for cannabis is.

le sigh.

 

[Red1966]

For some people, there are always, "good reasons for high taxes".

If every single person who smokes quit today, and the Tobacco industry closed its doors, that $193B in "lost revenue" would be made up in higher taxes somewhere else, probably in cannabis taxes.

That's not the revenue, it's the costs. Not much of which is born by the government. The taxes collected are 5 times that amount at the Federal level, not counting the state.

 

[UncleBuck]

That's not the revenue, it's the costs. Not much of which is born by the government. The taxes collected are 5 times that amount at the Federal level, not counting the state.

hey stormfront red,

this should help you score some points when you're emptying out the trash cans of your nobel prize winning colleagues.

http://grammarist.com/usage/borne-born/

 

[desert dude]

i love it when someone who doesn't grow or even smoke gets on a pot website and starts to dictate what the fair price for cannabis is.

le sigh.

Buck, do you know what the word, "dictate" means? My post was simply questioning what pot would cost in a free market. I compared it to Tobacco, a semi-free market, because the plants are similar in the amount and kind of work it takes to produce a market-ready product. NoDrama opined that cigarettes' actual cost is about $0.10 per pack of twenty, and I think he is about right. The market is the ultimate dictator, taking all factors into consideration.

In a free market, producers/distributors/sellers compete against one another to produce/distribute/sell a good product at a reasonable price. Buyers determine what price is reasonable, they get to dictate the price. It seems to me that many of you have deluded yourselves into believing that $3,000 per pound is a fair price. Some of you seem think a few months work tending half a dozen plants in your backyard is worthy of a living wage. I have farmers in my family. They make a decent living selling tobacco for $4.00 per pound, and they work 10 to 12 hour days pretty much year round.

You're right, I don't smoke pot or grow it; my interest in the matter is the politics of the drug war. The drug war is waged for money and no other reason, hence ending the drug war is bound to have profound effects on the price of pot. The government seems intent on inserting itself as the biggest drug gang and taking all the profits for itself. Half a moment's thought lets you realize that is not going to work, unless the aim is to continue the war and the violence. As long as the price of pot is in the thousands of dollars per pound range, the cartels will continue business as usual.

I stick by my estimate of $20 to $100 per pound for high grade cannabis in a free market.

Buck, why don't you take a crack at an estimate of a market-driven price for pot?

 

[fb360]

I wouldn't know anything about it but....
I'm assuming that you couldn't produce high grade MJ for $100 a pound unless you plan on off shoring the industry and using chineese slave labor or if you use farm subsidies and don't count that money into the cost.
You can't do it.
Maybe some decent outdoor
But not ....."high grade"

This ^^^, and even then only if you were growing 50+ lbs outdoor.

He contradicted himself by first stating that "pot should be priced at a point where all involved are able to make a living at growing, processing, distributing and selling it.", and then gave a price only MASSIVE producers could work with.

It costs me 150$ just in nutes to get 4lbs of dank. That doesn't take into account electricity, water, soil, equipment, time, etc...

My estimates on the market:
100$ for a lb of mersh
~1000$/lb of killer indoor.

1k/lb is an extremely good price in the free market. If you compare it in terms of consumption to liquor (I can drink a 5th in 1 night, which costs me ~$20) Therefore, i could consume 365 5ths, at 7.3k$/year. I can smoke about an 8th a day, which would take 128 days to complete a full lb. Using the same overall cost as a year of liquor consumption, it would equate to me consuming 2.85lbs in 1 year, at 2500$/lb.

 

[UncleBuck]

Some of you seem think a few months work tending half a dozen plants in your backyard is worthy of a living wage.

when did i ever say that?

my backyard plants are my christmas, my new clothes and shoes for the year, my automotive repairs, my safety net and perhaps a small vacation. not much else.

do you really think it is as simple as just 'tending a few plants in the backyard'? did you perhaps forget to take into account that little detail called security? i provided 24/7, 'round the clock security from early june to mid october. that includes camping out with the girls. if my wife and i left the house for any amount of time, we paid a neighbor to be our eyes for us for the hour or two we went out.

security alone for the grow: ~120 days of 24 hour vigilance = 360 days of 8 hour shifts.

then you get into trimming a decent outdoor harvest. my buddy up in the hills took down about 30 pounds or so, and it cost him 612 man hours to trim. 612 man hours = 15+ weeks of 40 hour weeks. i grew about a third of what he did and clocked in about 200 hours of trimming by my lonesome.

there is the case to be made for a good outdoor grow providing enough income to live on for a year, but i won't be the one to make it. i will say that when you do everything, including security and manual labor (on top of your own carpenter, gardener, etc), the hours stack up to about a year worth of work within 4 months.

i'm sure there is a model where you can grow a large plot and chuck it into an auto-trimmer and pump out cheap pounds, but i'm sure that most people who have used cannabis for any amount of time would reject it.

there are cheap 6 packs at the store by the vineyards around here still manage to move their $100 bottles of wine with ease. and they don't even have to worry about anyone ripping their grapes in the dead of night.

 

[cannabineer]

Buck, do you know what the word, "dictate" means? My post was simply questioning what pot would cost in a free market. I compared it to Tobacco, a semi-free market, because the plants are similar in the amount and kind of work it takes to produce a market-ready product. NoDrama opined that cigarettes' actual cost is about $0.10 per pack of twenty, and I think he is about right. The market is the ultimate dictator, taking all factors into consideration. In a free market, producers/distributors/sellers compete against one another to produce/distribute/sell a good product at a reasonable price. Buyers determine what price is reasonable, they get to dictate the price. It seems to me that many of you have deluded yourselves into believing that $3,000 per pound is a fair price. Some of you seem think a few months work tending half a dozen plants in your backyard is worthy of a living wage. I have farmers in my family. They make a decent living selling tobacco for $4.00 per pound, and they work 10 to 12 hour days pretty much year round. You're right, I don't smoke pot or grow it; my interest in the matter is the politics of the drug war. The drug war is waged for money and no other reason, hence ending the drug war is bound to have profound effects on the price of pot. The government seems intent on inserting itself as the biggest drug gang and taking all the profits for itself. Half a moment's thought lets you realize that is not going to work, unless the aim is to continue the war and the violence. As long as the price of pot is in the thousands of dollars per pound range, the cartels will continue business as usual. I stick by my estimate of $20 to $100 per pound for high grade cannabis in a free market. Buck, why don't you take a crack at an estimate of a market-driven price for pot?

How much labor goes into that pound of tobacco? cn

 

[desert dude]

This ^^^, and even then only if you were growing 50+ lbs outdoor.

He contradicted himself by first stating that "pot should be priced at a point where all involved are able to make a living at growing, processing, distributing and selling it.", and then gave a price only MASSIVE producers could work with.

It costs me 150$ just in nutes to get 4lbs of dank. That doesn't take into account electricity, water, soil, equipment, time, etc...

My cousin owns about 150 acres in Kentucky and is allowed to grow about 3,000 pounds of tobacco annually; yes, the government sets the amount of tobacco allowed on every given farm. That is hardly "MASSIVE".

Please notice that I did not say, or imply, that you would be able to compete in a free market selling your pot.

 

[desert dude]

How much labor goes into that pound of tobacco? cn

I am not certain but I would guess about $1.00, and all other inputs about $1.00.

 

[cannabineer]

I am not certain but I would guess about $1.00, and all other inputs about $1.00.

I lack the conversion for dollars to hours. Understanding that a pound of well-trimmed (not the cheap-ass commercial trim I see and despise) weed takes 20ish man-hours, would you not consider that a factor that requires addressing? cn

 

[scroglodyte]

outdoor brickweed? maybe that's not worth as much as ppl are gettin', but indoor bud costs a lot to grow, and is labor intensive. i think a thousand a pound is more likely figure. (i hope)

 

[desert dude]

when did i ever say that?

my backyard plants are my christmas, my new clothes and shoes for the year, my automotive repairs, my safety net and perhaps a small vacation. not much else.

do you really think it is as simple as just 'tending a few plants in the backyard'? did you perhaps forget to take into account that little detail called security? i provided 24/7, 'round the clock security from early june to mid october. that includes camping out with the girls. if my wife and i left the house for any amount of time, we paid a neighbor to be our eyes for us for the hour or two we went out.

security alone for the grow: ~120 days of 24 hour vigilance = 360 days of 8 hour shifts.

then you get into trimming a decent outdoor harvest. my buddy up in the hills took down about 30 pounds or so, and it cost him 612 man hours to trim. 612 man hours = 15+ weeks of 40 hour weeks. i grew about a third of what he did and clocked in about 200 hours of trimming by my lonesome.

there is the case to be made for a good outdoor grow providing enough income to live on for a year, but i won't be the one to make it. i will say that when you do everything, including security and manual labor (on top of your own carpenter, gardener, etc), the hours stack up to about a year worth of work within 4 months.

i'm sure there is a model where you can grow a large plot and chuck it into an auto-trimmer and pump out cheap pounds, but i'm sure that most people who have used cannabis for any amount of time would reject it.

there are cheap 6 packs at the store by the vineyards around here still manage to move their $100 bottles of wine with ease. and they don't even have to worry about anyone ripping their grapes in the dead of night.

In a free market you would need about as much security as I do for my tomato plants, so that cost goes away. Trimming will be done by machines most likely, and probably not by the individual grower but by the manufacturer of the final product, e.g. Philip Morris.

I agree that there probably will be a market for "boutique pot" that sells for $10 per gram, but that market is bound to be very small because there aren't enough foolish people around to support it.

 

[fb360]

My cousin owns about 150 acres in Kentucky and is allowed to grow about 3,000 pounds of tobacco annually; yes, the government sets the amount of tobacco allowed on every given farm. That is hardly "MASSIVE".

Please notice that I did not say, or imply, that you would be able to compete in a free market selling your pot.

First and foremost, since I have added this, I would like to show the math again comparing liquor to pot:
My estimates on the market:
100$ for a lb of mersh
~1000$/lb of killer indoor.

1k/lb is an extremely good price in the free market. If you compare it in terms of consumption to liquor (I can drink a 5th in 1 night, which costs me ~$20) Therefore, i could consume 365 5ths, at 7.3k$/year. I can smoke about an 8th a day, which would take 128 days to complete a full lb. Using the same overall cost as a year of liquor consumption, it would equate to me consuming 2.85lbs in 1 year, at ~2500$/lb.

Secondly, just think about it dude. You say about 100$ per lb, yet give no reason to think that is even attainable.
Lets say you are growing indoors: It takes a minimum of about 2 month to produce flowers, even if you don't veg. Consequently, in the time you are growing your lb, you rack up:
2months of electricity
2months of nutes
2months of water
2months of labor
2months of equipment use

That is all for 1 lb, even before the actual harvest begins...
The ONLY way your prediction could work is if they did all of that on a MASSIVE scale. There is just no room for profit with your prediction of 100$/lb

 

[UncleBuck]

In a free market you would need about as much security as I do for my tomato plants, so that cost goes away. Trimming will be done by machines most likely, and probably not by the individual grower but by the manufacturer of the final product, e.g. Philip Morris.

I agree that there probably will be a market for "boutique pot" that sells for $10 per gram, but that market is bound to be very small because there aren't enough foolish people around to support it.

so unguarded cannabis will suddenly become unattractive to an opportunistic thief?



and why in the hell would prices go UP to $10 a gram with competitors going for much less? it's not even $10 a gram around here nowadays.

you make some silly assumptions there, DEA dude. definitely out of your element.