Although it’s been around for nearly 40 years, the “Iron Law of Prohibition” is as popular as ever. For the uninitiated, the concept holds that “as law enforcement becomes more intense, the potency of prohibited substances increases.” Or, put simply, “the harder the enforcement, the harder the drugs.” 

The so-called Iron Law is invoked just about any time there’s a shift in the drug trade, most recently during the U.S. opioid crisis. Although the theory seems compelling, in reality, it is deeply flawed and ignores an even more powerful force — economics.  

I’m not the first to call the concept into question. As Keith Humphreys, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University has noted, “The Iron Law of Prohibition is looking pretty rusted out these days.” Yet, everywhere I look, prohibition continues to be blamed for the increasingly lethal and complex drug supply.

The truth is, it’s just business.

Drug trafficking organizations are profit-driven enterprises. For drug traffickers, it is indeed “all about the Benjamins,” and like all dedicated capitalists, their decisions are guided by a desire to  minimize risk and maximize profit. This has led to a surge in synthetic drugs, which offer significant advantages over traditional, plant-based drugs.

It’s not surprising traffickers embraced synthetic drugs. What’s surprising is that it took so long. 

For decades, traffickers in Central and South America cultivated crops like coca, poppy and cannabis, largely because of favorable growing conditions and a lack of alternative economic opportunities. But farming was (and still is) slow, labor-intensive, and subject to things like drought and blight. It’s also not particularly lucrative. 

Sitting at the bottom of the supply chain, campesinos — peasant farmers — make literally pennies on the dollar, barely enough to carve out a living. Still, this was the traditional way drugs were made, and it lasted for a long time. But as with every other market, advances in technology, transportation and globalization have fundamentally transformed the illicit drug trade.

Today, synthetic drugs are proliferating all over the world — not because of prohibition, but because it’s cheaper, easier and more profitable to sell synthetic drugs than plant-based drugs. 

Imagine you own a business that sells avocados for $1,000/kilogram, then one day you discover a way to develop a lab-made version that nets $50,000/kilogram. That’s how we ended up with drugs like fentanyl.

What does this have to do with the Iron Law of Prohibition? Whether you believe today’s synthetic drugs are the result of prohibition or a strategic pivot by drug trafficking organizations, these new substances are here to stay. 

It’s true that we cannot arrest or seize our way out of the drug crisis. Drug control requires a comprehensive, all-of-the-above approach that includes long-term investments in demand reduction, harm reduction, treatment and recovery — but enforcement matters, and when done right, it can have a massive impact.  

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, persistent, coordinated enforcement action by the U.S. and Colombia successfully dismantled the Medellín and Cali cartels, two of the world’s most powerful transnational criminal organizations. 

In 2005, when the U.S. enacted the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act, which placed strict controls over the sale of ephedrine and pseudoephedrine, U.S.-based production of meth largely evaporated. More recently, when Beijing banned all fentanyl-related substances in 2019, seizures of fentanyl shipped directly from China to the U.S. plummeted almost overnight.  

Yes, the Colombian cocaine trade is still active, and yes, increased regulatory pressure in the U.S. and China shifted drug production to Mexico, a classic case of the “balloon effect.” But the rise in synthetic drugs, and the fact that they can be manufactured anywhere, reinforces the need to ensure strong, smart drug controls everywhere. Today, the drug trade is thriving in places like Colombia and Mexico precisely because authorities lack the capacity to stop it. 

The answer is not to give up on enforcement; rather, it is renewed commitment by the international community to enhance security cooperation, build institutional capacity and increase enforcement efforts in the places that need it most. Together, we must find a way to deflate the balloon.

To be sure, enforcement alone cannot solve the drug problem. The only way to “win” the drug war is to curb Americans’ insatiable appetite for illicit substances. Or, as Matt Graver, Josh Brolin’s titular character in “Sicario” put it — “until somebody finds a way to convince 20 percent of the population to stop snorting and smoking that [stuff], order’s the best we can hope for.” 

The illicit drug landscape continues to evolve with new, deadly substances emerging every day. Meanwhile, traffickers continue to innovate and adapt their business model in pursuit of even greater profits. 

This new era of synthetic drugs requires new thinking and a more proactive approach. Reflecting on how we got here, and how we get ourselves out, don’t blame prohibition. Blame “Narconomics.”

Jim Crotty served as deputy chief of Staff at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration from 2019-2021 and currently sits on the advisory board of the nonprofit United Against Fentanyl. 

, 2025-10-09 12:30:00, , TheHill.com Just In, %%https://thehill.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/cropped-favicon-512px-1.png?w=32, https://thehill.com/homenews/feed/, Jim Crotty, opinion contributor