The Nevada Department of Taxation and the Cannabis Compliance Board released figures on Wednesday showing $1,003,467,665 of taxable sales for the industry over a 12-month period.

The breakdown of sales reported by county is:

• Clark County $791,100,017
• Washoe County $135,326,790
• All other counties $77,040,859

The amounts above are for the fiscal year of 2021 which took place from July 20, 2020, through June 30, 2021. The total is an increase of more than $318 million from 2020.

Funding Education

In 2019, Gov. Steve Sisolak signed Senate Bill 545, directing all revenue from the 10% retail cannabis tax towards education, too.

“This is what Nevadans expected since the legalization of recreational cannabis,” said Gov. Sisolak in a press release. “Education remains one of my top priorities, and I’m proud to see promised tax revenue from cannabis sales directly funding our students and classrooms.”

The money from these cannabis wholesale and retail taxes goes into the state's Distributive School Account (DSA), which is like a big pot of soup. Multiple sources of education funding make up the ingredients. That soup is then ladled out to all of Nevada's school districts in every county.

A Booming Industry

Cannabis is booming. New numbers from Nevada’s Cannabis Compliance Board and Department of Taxation show the cannabis industry had more than $1 billion in taxable sales in the last year. What these figures really show is that it is a product everyone is becoming more and more comfortable with. And these gains are for the history books.

“It existed in the shadows for so long—you’d probably have to talk to someone from the 20s and 30s when alcohol was finally legalized,” said a managing partner at Inyo Fine Cannabis Dispensary.

From July 2020 to June 2021, cannabis has generated over a billion dollars in taxable sales in Nevada, and $791 million of that was in Clark County.

“I think we’re slowly but surely eroding the black market that existed for cannabis at the time," he said. "So, very excited about not only what this industry has done, but where it’s going to go.”

Job Creation and Expansion

“It’s very encouraging just being in the cannabis industry and seeing results like that in such a short period of time,” said the marketing manager at Planet 13. And the state needs plenty of budtenders.

“Three years ago, we could run this shop with 15, 20 people," said Goldwater. "We’re up to 35+ people in a single shop.”

“We are growing and with that said, with that sales floor expansion, we did hire as necessary," said Cabrera. "But we’re trying to keep up with the pace.”

Tax Breakdown

Gross sales figures have a lot of components—county tax, sales tax, excise tax—there’s a lot of money that comes out for taxes. And $159 million goes toward the Distributive School Account fund.

“So, schools benefit, people benefit from jobs, owners in the industry benefit from the growing industry,” said Goldwater.

Pandemic Adaptation

Cannabis is not pandemic-proof. The state’s regulatory and political leadership helped it move along and achieve the sales figures it sees today. Curbside sales were born in the pandemic, and are now the norm in the business.

“Like any business, it forced us to change for the better," said Goldwater. "And those of us that did change for the better, I think the customer’s happier.”