Retail sales of medical and recreational marijuana in the United States are expected to come in between $8 billion and $10 billion this year (a nearly 50% increase from 2017) and could reach $22 billion by 2022, according to Chris Walsh, industry analyst and editorial vice president of MJBizDaily. And that growth means there are a ton of job opportunities.

“The cannabis sector currently employs an estimated 125,000 to 160,000 full-time workers,” he said at The Marijuana Business Conference & Expo. “To put this in perspective, there are potentially more full-time marijuana industry workers than there are librarians or kindergarten teachers throughout the country – and over 6 times the number of coal miners in the U.S.”

The industry is projected to add as many as 340,000 full-time jobs by 2022, an estimated annual growth rate of 21%.

To put the sales numbers into more relatable terms, notes Walsh, 2017 U.S. sales of medical and recreational cannabis were nearly nine time higher than those Oreo cookies. And Americans spent nearly as much on weed as they did, collectively, on Netflix subscriptions.

This year, with California in the mix, industry sales could top McDonald’s annual revenue.

The numbers are likely to continue rising. The federal government doesn’t seem likely to reverse its stance on marijuana in the near future (though prominent former members of Congress have reversed their opposition). Still, more states are taking matters into their own hands and legalizing some form of the drug. This November, for instance, Michigan voters will decide whether to legalize recreational use. And Missouri seems poised to put the issue of medical marijuana on the ballot this year as well. New Jersey and New York are also floating the idea.

That’s going to open up a lot of budtender jobs in the years to come.

大麻行业媒体MJBizDaily主管编辑事务的副总裁、行业分析师克里斯·沃尔什预计，今年美国医用和休闲娱乐用大麻的零售额将达80亿到100亿美元，较2017年增长近50%，到2022年可能达到220亿美元。如此明显增幅意味着，该行业会有大量的工作机会。

沃尔什在大麻商业博览会上表示：“目前大麻行业雇用全职劳动者预计有12.5万到16万人。从人数来看，美国从事大麻行业的全职人员可能比图书管理员或者幼师都多，而且是煤矿工人的六倍多。”

到2022年，大麻业料将增加多达34万个全职岗位，预计年增长率高达21%。

沃尔什指出，如果从更相关的角度理解，上述销售数据意味着，2017年美国医用和娱乐用大麻销售额几乎高出奥利奥饼干九倍。而且美国人对大麻的投入和订阅Netflix网站视频内容花费差不多。

今年加州成为美国第六个允许持牌照商家出售大麻的州，预计美国大麻业全年的销售额可能超过麦当劳营业收入。

而且销售额还可能继续增长。虽然一些知名前国会议员态度已转变，但美国联邦政府近期内立场可能不会改变。然而更多州将自行采取行动，将大麻某种形式上合法化。比如，密歇根州的选民今年11月就将投票决定，是否允许娱乐用大麻合法。密苏里州似乎准备就医用大麻进行投票。新泽西和纽约两个州也可能紧随其后。

总之，今后一些年里将出现很多大麻种植业的工作岗位。（财富中文网）

译者：Pessy

审稿：夏林