Without legal sales, opiate users get trash street drugs that vary anywhere between unsafe and catastrophically dangerous. Furthermore, there's absolutely none of the benefits like being able to encourage them to keep their used needles in sharps containers like you might be able to do, if they had to drop off the full ones before they got their next fix.
We don't get the reduction in violence we'd see from legal sales. None of it.
Decrim is what you get from cowardly legislators and imbecilic activists worried that Tweaky the Copper Wiring Thief isn't getting a fair shake at life.
Without legal sales, cartels will keep doing cartel things. Also where will money for treatment programs come from? It will always be at risk of being cut by fiscally conservative governments, vs legal sales that can be taxed to fund amelioration efforts.
That demonstrates that California did a very bad job at legalization. The black market arises when the taxes on a good exceed the risk of getting caught. If California had legalized marijuana and treated it like liquor, there would be no black market.
The same thing is true for tobacco - while it is legally to sell and consume (by super-adults, 21+) in every US state, they've taxed it so highly that there is a fantastic black market.
And Eric Garner is a great example of how the government with murder you on the _suspicion_ that you aren't paying your taxes. Garner commonly sold individual cigarettes ("loosies") which were usually untaxed; it does not appear he was selling on the day he was choked to death by the NYPD, but rather that he was targeted as a usual suspect.
So we should legalize all of this stuff for adults AND keep the taxes low enough to avoid black markets. Sadly, the folks in favor of "legalization" are often wetting themselves at the thought of the tax revenue.
I don't think cigarette taxes have been keeping up with inflation. They are like $12 for a pack now in Seattle, they were $10 a pack 7 years ago. So oddly enough, given the recent bout of inflation, they are actually affordable again.
In Sydney, they are $37AU a pack, or about $24 USD.
What are the sizes of those black markets? They're tiny, and limit the violence they do (since customers are willing to pay a slight premium for peace).
Hell, if it was legalized, we could limit the price by law... cost + 2% (or whatever margin the pharmaceutical companies would need to not refuse). They would out-compete the cartels in weeks.
Pretending that the black markets would remain to any great degree is just disingenuous.
Are they unguarded right now? Your casually sarcastic "just a thought" makes it sound like everyone else is an idiot for not doing something obvious. Or are you suggesting building a magnificant wall?
Thankfully our land and sea borders only total about 312 yards or so, two squads of border control could keep eyes on it at all times, and shut that stuff down.
We don't get the reduction in violence we'd see from legal sales. None of it.
Decrim is what you get from cowardly legislators and imbecilic activists worried that Tweaky the Copper Wiring Thief isn't getting a fair shake at life.