One, no, they don't. Prosecution of independent sellers is a significant revenue stream, and given the constraints on goverment, all revenue is a big deal.
That's demonstrably false. The pittance in fines and confiscated cash that come from drug arrests is nothing compared to the huge cost of imprisoning millions of people on drug charges, as well as the cost of enforcement itself (and the opportunity cost to police forces, too- they presumably have many better things to do with their resources besides arresting drug dealers). In
this paper published by the CATO Institute, Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron estimates that ending the War on Drugs will net $41.3 billion per year from savings alone, and that the taxation of narcotics at a comparable rate to alcohol or tobacco will provide another $46.7 billion. That's $88 billion in total that drug legalization would bring to government. Regardless of your opinion on drug legalization, an argument that current policies save money doesn't really hold up at all.
