Without a doubt, marijuana has become the zeitgeist of the 2010s and bled over to the 2020s. While marijuana had just 12% supporting legalization in 1969, that percentage increased nearly 6 times as of 2023.
Historical Impacts of Marijuana Legalization
In that time, marijuana saw its first legalization in 2012 in the states of Washington and Colorado. Since that time, it has spread to over half of all US states. Notable officials like Wisconsin governor Tony Evers and New York attorney general Kathryn Russo have both taken a public pro-marijuana stance.
While it has seen this widespread growth, not all states have the same rules surrounding marijuana. Let’s have some examples:
1. In Alaska
A person is allowed to have up to one ounce of marijuana at a time, regardless of recreational or medicinal intent. However, in Washington, this rule is based on the amount of ‘usable marijuana’. This means up to 72 ounces of liquid marijuana, 16 ounces of marijuana concentrate, or 7 grams of marijuana-infused edibles.
2. In Oregon
You can even grow up to 24 ounces of medical marijuana, which is not legal in many other states. While some states only allow marijuana possession, states like Colorado have geared legislation to legalize possession and integrate it into social customs and daily life.
Some Other States
Some states buck the trend, though, exactly 4 as of 2025. States like Wyoming and South Carolina treat it as a misdemeanor. Idaho has some of the harshest penalties, with a misdemeanor for possession and a felony for distribution. However, Wyoming is an example of legislation having a delay before catching up to the views of its constituents.
Marijuana Legalization Impact on Your Company
As of 2020, a reported 54% of Wyoming adult employees supported legalizing personal marijuana. Not only does Wyoming not have any legal avenues for marijuana, but the state still penalizes and deters marijuana possession extremely. Having marijuana can get as much as 5 years in prison and a $10,000 fine, depending on how much there is.
Many states are stuck between these two ends of the spectrum. A few states have only decriminalized marijuana. This is because they are not quite on board with the legalization of marijuana, but no longer want to punish a substance that is legal across most of the U.S. A step up from decriminalization is medicinal marijuana only.
This status encompasses the bulk of states where marijuana is neither completely legal nor illegal. Major states like Florida and Texas are also in this category, where legal marijuana has been proposed but has not yet been passed. Finally, the last category is states where marijuana is medicinal and recreational possession is decriminalized.
This only includes the states of Hawaii, New Hampshire, and North Dakota. While social change often empowers individual U.S. citizens, this suite of changes is not as straightforward when it comes to businesses. Because states and sometimes even local governments are legalizing marijuana individually, national-scale businesses can find it a nightmare to keep track of these changes.
On top of that, certain states are actively working to prevent discrimination against marijuana users in society. The aforementioned Colorado has mandated that restaurants and hotels have a designated cannabis-smoking section. Similarly, California has forbidden employers from asking employees about cannabis use outside of work. While lawmakers certainly aimed these changes at making marijuana a less scrutinized topic, they did so at the expense of businesses.
On a larger scale, at least 5 states have banned pre-employment marijuana testing. This includes states like Nevada and Illinois. Also, 16 states require accommodation for those prescribed medicinal marijuana. It’s much more than regulations around testing, though. The tests used for marijuana themselves are seeing an unprecedented rate of invalid tests. There has been a year-over-year increase of 45% from 2022 to 2023, which comes out to 25,000 invalid drug tests. Another 6,000 samples were deemed to be ‘substituted’ and deemed ineligible to be used for drug testing. When all the regulations have popped up, the trouble around the drug tests themselves, and the varying legality surrounding marijuana across the country, many companies have simply given up. Around half of U.S. employers simply ceased testing for marijuana in their routine pre-employment drug tests.
While the decade of marijuana wraps up as more and more states legalize it, it’s important to keep your own company at the forefront of your mind. 10% of employees already admit to using marijuana, half of whom admit to using before work or at the workplace. Furthermore, around 40% of marijuana users use it only on a weekly basis. While it is relatively low now, the increase in marijuana accessibility and the growing number of officials who speak out in favor of marijuana mean an increase in users and an increase in prevalence at the workplace. To future-proof your business, monitor local and state marijuana laws closely.
Source: US Drug Test Centers
