This report was developed for The Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) which asked The Lewin Group to calculate more current estimates of the societal cost of drug abuse. In the context of this report, the phrase “drug abuse” is used to refer to consequences of using illicit drugs, as well as societal costs pertaining to the enforcement of drug laws. This study does not address costs related to abuse of or dependence on legal substances that may be termed drugs such as alcohol, tobacco, or prescription medications

As America entered the new millennium we culminated the most punishing decade in our nation’s history. While the number of persons in jail and prison grew by 462,006 in the seven decades from 1910 to 1980, in the 1990s alone, the number of jail and prison inmates grew by an estimated 816,965.The cost of this massive growth in incarceration is staggering. Americans will spend nearly $40 billion on prisons and jails in the year 2000. Almost $24 billion of that will go to incarcerate 1.2 million nonviolent offenders.4 Meanwhile, in two of our nation’s largest states, California and New York, the prison budgets outstripped the budgets for higher education during the mid-1990s.

Schiraldi, V., Holman, B., & Beatty, P.