The cannabis black market expanded vastly in California and elsewhere due to the legalization of cannabis, contrary to promises of proponents of legalizing pot.
As explained by the Los Angeles Times in a devastating expose that it published on Sept. 8, 2022, of the cannabis industry:
“ | Although no hard data exist on the size of the illegal market, it is indisputably many times larger than the licensed community. The Times' analysis of satellite images shows that unlicensed operations in many of California's biggest cultivation areas, such as parts of Trinity and Mendocino counties, outnumbered licensed farms by as much as 10 to 1.[1] | ” |
Southern Oregon, California, and Hawaii have immense amounts of illegal cannabis, grown and sold unlawfully despite the legalization of marijuana.[2]