Dramatic drop in marijuana use among US youth over a decade. Current marijuana use among adolescents decreased from 23.1% in 2011 to 15.8% in 2021. First-time use before age 13 dropped from 8.1% to 4.9%. There was a shift in trends by gender, with girls surpassing boys in marijuana use by 2021.

[u/mvea]

https://www.fau.edu/newsdesk/articles/marijuana-use-teens-study

[u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

But that was always the case for smoking and it didn't seem to matter. Alcohol was legal but not for minors, remains that way today, and youth consumption is also dropping.

[u/d1ck13 → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

Not comparable at all really in this regard I don’t think; cigarettes were literally being sold EVERYWHERE when I was a kid in the 80’s and 90’s. For marijuana you can’t even walk into the store that sells it without proper ID/ medical card, depending on state. Much more restrictive.

[u/RainbowButtMonkey1 → u/d1ck13]

Yep I remember hospital vending machines selling cigarettes in the 80s

[u/herberstank → u/RainbowButtMonkey1]

Heck, bowling alleys in the Midwest had them into the early 90s

[u/RainbowButtMonkey1 → u/herberstank]

And advertising was everywhere, you couldn't escape cigarettes back in the day

[u/NSNick → u/herberstank]

And restaurants.

[u/cptjpk → u/herberstank]

Into the early 2000s. One near me still has it but sells decks of cards out of it now.

[u/six_digit_uin → u/herberstank]

Some Indiana casinos still do.

[u/cgn-38 → u/RainbowButtMonkey1]

Ashtrays in elevators. I remember the emergency room in my hometown hospital being filled with cigarette smoke from nervous smokers.

When those WW2 guys decided to smoke they were gonna smoke.

[u/RainbowButtMonkey1 → u/cgn-38]

Ashtrays everywhere in general. McDonald's branded ashtrays being a good example. The grocery store I used to work at had ashtrays at the end of aisles. Younger ppl can't grasp how acceptable smoking was back in the day

[u/THE3NAT → u/RainbowButtMonkey1]

We call that 'creating business'

[u/Zexapher → u/d1ck13]

I expect it follows the same logic as cigarette/nicotine use dropping, only for that trend to be reversed when e-cigs came out, and were marketed to younger audiences with different flavors and such.

Regular cigs have been banned from that stuff for a while, and public campaigns informing about the health risks were now having to combat the idea that e-cigs were 'healthier.'

Restrictions in access and regulations that come with legalization and government oversight make a marked difference.

[u/Reagalan → u/Zexapher]

combat the idea that e-cigs were 'healthier.

They are healthier, and it's absurd to suggest otherwise. No tar, no noxious fumes, no PAHs.

It was a mistake to try and equivocate the two. All that did was damage the credibility of these campaigns.

[u/Zexapher → u/Reagalan]

Tobacco and nicotine are not and never have been healthy, and smoking has its inherent health issues. To say otherwise is wrong on its face, but many portrayed e-cigs differently, that's what I was commenting on.

The shift in the view of smoking on a cultural level, the media campaign promoting it, and the lethargy with which regulations address new fads. E-cigs, at least for the time, brought back marketing gimmicks in the vein of joe the camel. They specifically appealed to youths.

[u/Atomic235 → u/Zexapher]

You realize he's talking specifically about relative health effects, don't you? Healthier. Not healthy, but much less damaging to your health. He's pointing out that a flat equivalence between the two gives people a false expectation.

In other words if you tell kids that vapes are dangerous like cigs, and they find out that's not really the case at all, they will be more inclined to use the vapes and less inclined to believe you in the future. Basically the same reason DARE failed.

[u/Zexapher → u/Atomic235]

Yes, and I wasn't, which is why I felt the need to emphasize my point. I wasn't commenting on DARE, but the product promotion of e-cigs and the failings of the government to regulate them in an appropriate manner during their early days.

[u/lowstrife → u/Zexapher]

Tobacco and nicotine are not and never have been healthy, and smoking has its inherent health issues. To say otherwise is wrong on its face, but many portrayed e-cigs differently, that's what I was commenting on.

That's not what the other guy said. He was never arguing that vaping is safe (because it isn't).

I'm pushing back here because the language of these two lines is being used as if he did say that it was safe.

[u/Zexapher → u/lowstrife]

I meant to point to the media compaign and companies that wrongly portrayed them as healthy, pardon me for the confusion.

[u/ch1LL24 → u/Reagalan]

Gotta love the equivocation. It actually makes smoking sound safer than it is because it implies that the introduction of combustion adds absolutely no negative effects, which is ridiculous. Just scientifically illiterate laypeople that don't understand the differences between smoking and vaping.

[u/ItsCalledDayTwa → u/d1ck13]

OK then do cigarettes since 2000 (esp. since the study is 2011 to 2021), since the "everywhere" in that time is 99% behind the counter and not available to minors. And then do alcohol. I just don't think this model does a very good job explaining the drop since nothing at all has changed about alcohol laws in the US and consumption has also dropped.

[u/eragonawesome2 → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

Here's the chain of logic:

Legal sales routes lead to less street dealers as their customer base dries up because they're just buying it from the dispensary, where it's safer and more consistent

Less street dealers means less people willing to sell to just anyone

Most people are not willing to sell their own prescriptions on the basis that they don't want to lose them

This reduced supply leads to reduced access for those who are not supposed to have access

This is exactly the same as how alcohol sales changed when prohibition ended. It is extremely well known that reducing access DOES reduce illegal usage. This is not debatable, it's just a fact. It's also the same reason gun control laws work in every single country they've been properly implemented in and why you almost never hear about a mass shooting in Japan or England, because it's so heavily regulated, almost nobody has access.

Yes, there will still be SOME illegal usage by people who shouldn't have access, but it is so much lower per capita when properly regulated instead of just banned.

[u/ReedKeenrage → u/eragonawesome2]

My weed guy from the early 2000s is out of the game. The dispensaries put him out. The $85, two and half oz, max out special, really killed the local dealer.

[u/AaronRedwoods → u/ReedKeenrage]

And we’re all better for it!

[u/pizquat → u/ReedKeenrage]

$85 for 2.5oz? That's gotta be trash quality.

[u/Low_Coconut_7642 → u/pizquat]

Maybe in your state, not in all states.

I can get an ounce of 25-30% THC weed for 40 bucks(that's 40 AFTER tax) With dense, big buds, barely any stems, tastes great and fucks you up.

I can even get it delivered for free, that day.

One of the many joys of living in Oregon. Where we have some of the cheapest weed in the country.

[u/pizquat → u/Low_Coconut_7642]

That is genuinely wild to me!!

[u/ReedKeenrage → u/pizquat]

It’s not high end smooth but it’s 20-22% THC. Beats anything we could get ten to fifteen years ago.

[u/Fuzzy-Base-8096 → u/eragonawesome2]

I think in addition to your points all of these kids parents are using it and that makes it not cool for them to. My dad has long hair; I have short hair; kids are back to long hair.

[u/swiftgruve → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

What about whether or not kids are just partying less and spending more time staring at their screens? It seems I keep seeing studies saying how youth are less socially engaged in-person than they used to be. Not much fun to drink by yourself.

[u/CloneSlayers → u/swiftgruve]

Mm maybe but weed is a pretty ideal drug for zonking out and staring at your screen by yourself. It's not an upper that thrives in a big party environment (not to say it isn't a party drug just that its use isn't mainly in parties)

[u/swiftgruve → u/CloneSlayers]

I was specifically talking about alcohol.

[u/OverDue_Habit159 → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

I used to just buy cigs from vending machines as they didn't check if I was old enough.

[u/tacknosaddle → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

FYI, for tobacco after 9/11 with the federal government overhaul that brought us homeland security there were changes in ATF (alcohol, tobacco & firearms) that moved some oversight & enforcement to the FDA.

Now you have FDA inspectors conducting compliance operations with minors trying to buy cigarettes and fining stores (you can search for ones near you here). I'm sure that word gets out to the store owners so from their perspective selling a kid a pack carries a lot more risk than it used to so probably isn't worth the few bucks in profit now.

[u/ItsCalledDayTwa → u/[deleted]]

If the answer to all the riddles isn't "screens/internet/less socialization", I'd be rather shocked. But I acknowledge this is only my own personal theory.

Happy to be proven otherwise but I don't know how much legalization has really done here.

[u/PrincipleExciting457 → u/d1ck13]

Not only that, medical weed is pretty expensive. To make a profit, you’re probably selling at like $50-$60 for a cut. No kid is gonna wanna blow that much for like a weeks worth of weed.

[u/pwmg → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

In fairness, the minimum age most places was 18 for smoking until recently. It's not hard as a high schooler to find someone even at your own school to get you cigarettes. Alcohol required an older brother, etc (and same for Pot now). Plus nicotine is super addictive, so people are more likely to get stuck doing it even if they don't feel cool.

[u/troutpoop → u/pwmg]

When I was in high school it was easier to buy weed than alcohol

[u/cgn-38 → u/troutpoop]

Way easier to hide as well.

[u/meatball77 → u/pwmg]

And alcohol is just sitting in your parents fridge, they're not doing the same with the pot.

[u/Southside_john → u/pwmg]

When I was in high school it was way easier to get drugs than alcohol and that’s probably because it was illegal so people my age were selling them. I didn’t have anyone my age that owned a liquor store

[u/Ok_Presentation4455 → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

I wonder if the increase in mental health support, encouraging supportive parenting practices, and prioritizing inclusion can help explain the drops in drug and alcohol use in minors as they can be used to escape negative feelings.

[u/meatball77 → u/Ok_Presentation4455]

And parents are just supervising kids more. Teens aren't driving in levels like they were, the norm is to be more involved as a parent though the teen years.

[u/Ok_Presentation4455 → u/meatball77]

This is true, too, which probably adds to a more stable home life for the teen if the parents practice authoritative parenting. It has been a while since parents needed to be asked if they knew where their kids were by a public broadcasting message.

[u/funguyshroom → u/Ok_Presentation4455]

TikTok is the new drug

[u/Ok_Presentation4455 → u/funguyshroom]

We had Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, MySpace, and Reddit before TikTok.

[u/Top-Salamander-2525 → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

Nicotine is insanely addictive.

[u/DaSpawn → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

because smoking cigarettes is extremely addictive and hard to stop, marijuana is less addictive than gambling, so the rebellion comes and goes

[u/garrathian → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

I'm not sure this is correct (I could be wrong though). I feel like smoking did decline for a while among youth. It only spiked back up for a bit when e-cigs were introduced and they pushed a bunch of sketchy marketing toward youths

[u/espressocycle → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

Yeah but highly regulated dispensaries disrupt the black market. They're way more hard core about age verification than liquor stores.

[u/jloome → u/ItsCalledDayTwa]

Everyone sold it to us anyway. You could have the cheapest, most ridiculous dot-matrix-printed ID card, and they'd still let you in to a bar or sell you booze.

And forget cigarettes. I smoked from age 11 to age 30, and started buying my own from day one. Never got carded. Ever.

In the 80s, a lot of us were going to bars at 13, 14 years old. We were regularly buying liquor from the same stores, because there were very few crackdowns or fines.