Medical pot users to pay sales tax

[Maine-ah]

AUGUSTA, Maine — Included in the final catch-all tax bill signed into law Friday by Gov. John Baldacci is a provision that taxes the sale of medical marijuana at state-sanctioned dispensaries.
“We wanted to make sure that it is taxed,” Rep. Thomas Watson, D-Bath, co-chairman of the Legislature’s Taxation Committee, told members of the Appropriations Committee in the final review of the tax bill on Wednesday. “It is one of the recommendations of Maine Revenue Service that we didn’t follow. They recommended it not be taxed, but the committee — all that were in the room, both parties — said it should be taxed.”

The decision is estimated to result in about $71,000 a year in additional sales tax revenue. Sen. Richard Nass, R-Acton, said lawmakers on the committee rejected the Maine Revenue Service position that marijuana used for medical reasons was the same as a prescription drug.

They wanted to exempt it from the tax because they considered it to be medicine,” he said. “We discussed it for about an hour and decided to go in a different direction and make it clear it should be taxed.”

http://www.bangordailynews.com/detail/140857.html

[ensho]

1. that's OK

nt

[Oregone]

2. Too bad

It is *medicine* and all

[GodlessBiker]

3. It should be treated like other medicine for tax purposes.

[JBoy]

4. I like where this is going

The state has long taxed the sale of medications that do not require a prescription. He said the system established in the new medical marijuana law requires a doctor to find a person’s medical condition could be helped by using the drug, but does not require a prescription.

“It is helpful to people who need it and want it, but it is not a prescription medicine,” he said. “Once we got to that, we decided it should be taxed.”

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It's like vitamins!

[Fly by night]

8. No. The reason it cannot be prescribed has to do with its Schedule I classification ...

... in the Controlled Substance Act. Any physician who prescribed cannabis would be at risk of losing their right to prescribe other medications. (The same goes for pharmacies.)

[progressoid]

5. Good,

The more this is mainstreamed, the better. Make it part of an acceptable legal system.

[robdogbucky]

6. I think this is the model

it has been using in other states. I know California taxes MMJ, and it has been an incentive for cash-strapped communities. I know that some municipalities have lauded this windfall. Seems to go right in line with other "sin," taxes. Now that Indian gaming has been such a financial success for the tribes involved, I think communities are waking up to the power they have to create revenue where there was none before.

The MMJ model gives communities/states the ability to provide medicine to poeple it helps. MMJ informs how the product can be provided and distributed. Currently, there are collectives and co-ops that control the supply to dispensaries, where it is taxed upon sale to the patient. Local governments can actually see how it can work, can see the actual operation of production, supply and distribution in an orderly fashion. They can also see the widespread and far-reaching need and applications for the weed in its organic form.

The current proposed California initiative uses the tax revenues incentive to drive its message. Turning a law enforcement problem into a cash windfall for strapped state coffers and promoting a new industry;

http://www.taxcannabis.org/

Onne state at a time.

[Fly by night]

7. There are a number of problems with the Maine proposal

To begin with, they took little input from people who, you know, actually know how to grow cannabis.

Then they decided to charge their dispensaries a $15,000 up-front fee to go into business. This fee will insure that medical cannabis will continue to cost an outrageous amount of money for Maine patients.

For a more sensible and patient-friendly approach to medical cannabis, search out an old thread of mine here at DU entitled "Let's Roll". (I would post the link myself but I'm at my local library and it's apparently not possible to cut-and-paste on their computers.)

[Roon]

9. Been paying pot tax for awhile now

My dispensary adjusts the final sale price to round out to an even number for the final transaction.So you are still paying 50.00 an eighth instead of 53.45 and eighth. Liqour stores do the same. Works out great.

[jberryhill]

10. I Blame Big Ganja

The Ganja interests are obviously in bed with the politicians and the snack food industry.