SPRINGFIELD – Illinois residents were tightly restricted due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but they broke records spending on marijuana – one of the few prospering businesses in the state this past year.
Through November, officials report $582 million in weed sales, generating more than $150 million in tax revenue.
A brilliant observation from Center Square: "Within three months time in 2020, cannabis in Illinois went from being illegal to essential, and it is big money."
…Gov. J.B. Pritzker deemed certain retail outlets nonessential and shut them down, while pot stores were deemed essential. The Governor’s Cannabis Regulation Oversight Officer Toi Hutchinson in September noted sales continued to increase month after month.
“The sales of this have been through the roof, through the middle of a global pandemic,” Hutchinson said. “[Revenue] is targeted to those very communities that are disproportionately impacted.”
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