The National Drug Control Strategy - The Cost Of Drug Abuse

The Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), a part of the White House, issued a report in 2004 on the economic costs of drug abuse, The Economic Costs of Drug Abuse in the United States: 1992-2002 (http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/publications/economic_costs/economic_costs.pdf). The report included such costs as those to the health care system; the cost of crime associated with drug abuse; and such economic impacts as job loss and decreased productivity. The estimated direct and indirect societal cost for 2002 was $180.9 billion, according to the agency; corresponding costs for 1992 were $102.2 billion and for 1998 were $143.4 billion. Costs increased in the 1992-2002 period at a rate of 5.3% a year. The nation's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the entire economy, in comparison, increased in this same period at a rate of 5.1% a year. (See Table 10.1 and Table 10.2.)

The raw number—$180.9 billion—is huge and difficult to grasp without comparisons. The cost is very significant. In 2002, for instance, doctors' offices had total revenues of $236 billion and all dentists earned $69 billion (Service Annual Survey: 2002, U.S. Census Bureau). Total expenditures of all colleges and universities in 2001-2002 were $317 billion (Digest of Educational Statistics, U.S. National Center for Education Statistics, annual).

Most of the $180.9 billion cited by ONDCP is accounted for by estimates of lost productivity ($128.6 billion or 71%). Elements of this figure are premature death, time lost through illness and incarceration, time spent in criminal careers, and other unproductive time expended by victims of crime and of individuals during hospitalization. Direct health care costs accounted for $15.8 billion in 2002 and other expenses for $36.4 billion. The two largest components of the "other" category were state corrections expenditures (34% of the category) and police protection (28% of the category).