You've found yourself in a marijuana dispensary – much as I did earlier this year in Portland – a display case full of legal weed right in front of you. There are buds, vape pens, cookies, even lotions.
The budtender, a friendly and knowledgeable sort, offers some advice. You ask for something simple and cheap, a joint perhaps. The budtender pulls out a few joints containing trim, or the weed that didn’t make it in the jars with the rest of the buds.
It’s $10, plus tax. Right around what you were looking to spend. You’ve got yourself a deal, budtender.
Legal marijuana purchases like the hypothetical one here are now commonplace out West and could soon become a New Jersey reality. But when you buy weed, what are you really paying for?
Here’s the answer, based on numbers from one of the medical marijuana operations in New Jersey that also does business in other states. The company asked not to be identified, so as not to give away sensitive trade or tax information.
The $10 you just spent on a joint goes toward: