Stimulus plan that won’t cost much – federal, state, and local

Government at all levels are scrambling to stimulate the economy, mostly through either big spending packages or through tax cuts.

One way to increase economic activity without spending much, if any money, is the liberalization of vice laws. At present cities, states, and even entire countries loose revenue to locations that have more liberal laws concerning sex, drugs, and gambling. All these stimulus projects would require is the repeal or loosening of a few existing laws and regulations.

I’m a big proponent of ending drug prohibition. However, that’s going to be hard to do and there is is a huge bureaucracy and multiple government agencies in place for drug enforcement. So using drug legalization or decriminalization as a stimulus is a longer and more complicated process than legalizing/decriminalizing other vices*.

Federal:

  • Repeal the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act portion of the SAFE Port Act.
  • Loosen requirements for obtaining a license to distill hard liquor.
  • Stop interfering with states drinking age limits
  • State:

  • Repeal prostitution laws
  • Repeal gambling laws
  • Grant more liquor licenses, make them easier to obtain
  • Loosen requirements for brewers and wine makers.
  • Reduce the legal drinking age to 18
  • Repeal smoking bans
  • Repeal state gun licensing laws, hand gun bans, etc.
  • Repeal sex toy laws and similar silly laws
  • City:

  • Repeal any local laws that interfere with the above
  • Repeal zoning laws that interfere with the establishment of strip clubs, brothels, casinos, porn stores and bars within city limits.
  • Repeal public intoxication and open container laws (outside of automobiles, of course)
  • Repeal local gun licensing laws, hand gun bans, etc.
  • *One alternative would be to start by un-scheduling drugs that don’t currently take a lot of law enforcements resources currently, such as ketamine, LSD, DMT, psilocybin, and various analogs. This leaves all law enforcement agencies in-tact and operating at or near present levels while freeing up the market to ramp up sale and manufacture of these drugs. Also, change the scheduling of many prescription drugs to make them easier to obtain without a prescription.

    4 Comments

    1. I agree with just about everything here. What I’m not sure about is the gun law stuff. Why would repealing gun laws be good? I’m not arguing one way or another, I simply don’t understand.

    2. It’s good, from a strictly economic point of view, because it would increase gun sales.

    3. So you’re basing your plan on purely economic reasons?

    4. Yes, it’s a stimulus plan after all. I don’t disagree ethically with any of the points (I could probably think of a few things that would improve the economy short term that I wouldn’t actually want to see done), but the point is that all of these are ways governments could help stimulate the economy without spending a lot of money.

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