The legal U.S. cannabis industry has fewer full-time workers than it did a year ago, according to the 2026 U.S. Cannabis Jobs Report from staffing firm Vangst and Whitney Economics. New York again stood out as a growth market. Here is what the report says, what earlier versions of this story got wrong, and what New York's own data show about jobs here.
What the 2026 report found
The report counts 412,500 full-time jobs across 40 legal state markets. The previous edition, released in May 2025, counted 425,002, so the industry lost about 12,500 jobs, or roughly 3 percent. National legal retail revenue was $29.1 billion in 2025, down from $30.1 billion in 2024, per NORML's summary of the report.
The truly new milestone is on the sales side. The report describes 2025 as the industry's first-ever annual sales decline. Jobs, however, had fallen before. A 2023 report counted 417,493 jobs, about 2 percent lower, and called it the first year-over-year decline of the legal era. The 2025 edition reported a loss of 15,443 jobs. That means headcount has dropped in three of the last four annual reports, with a rebound to about 440,000 in the 2024 edition. Our headline overstates how new the job decline is, and this version corrects the body.
The report's authors blame price compression more than falling demand. "2025 marked an inflection point. Price compression reshaped the market," said Beau Whitney, chief economist at Whitney Economics.
New York's place in the numbers
New York is one of the report's highlighted markets. Vangst's summary says New York added 16,160 jobs, and NORML reports the state now has 28,660 full-time cannabis workers, behind only California (57,500) and Michigan (42,500). NORML said New York and Maryland had the biggest year-over-year gains.
Those two figures imply New York had roughly 12,500 workers a year earlier, which would mean growth of about 130 percent. That is High Today's arithmetic from the report's published numbers, not a figure the report states. An earlier version of this story gave growth of about 209 percent. That percentage, along with the Mississippi, Ohio, Arizona and Illinois figures it cited, appears to come from the 2025 edition, which named New York, Mississippi and Ohio as the fastest-growing markets and Arizona and Illinois among those shrinking.
Why New York is still hiring
New York's market is younger than most, and its own data show why jobs keep coming. At the October 1, 2026 Cannabis Control Board meeting, OCM reported:
- 712 adult-use retail stores opened, with an average of 18.1 openings a month in 2026.
- 327 licensed retailers not yet open, a pipeline of future jobs.
- 2,351 total adult-use licenses across cultivation, processing, distribution and retail.
The September board deck adds that 313 licensed growers were operating as of August. Renewing licensees must report employee demographic, wage and benefit information and show a labor peace agreement. (Update, Oct. 31: The law Gov. Hochul signed Oct. 28 ends mandatory labor peace agreements in its signed text.)
New York is also starting to feel the pressure that cost jobs elsewhere. OCM data show average adult-use prices down about 8 percent from January to September 2026 and sales per store down 1.7 percent, with the sharpest squeeze on Long Island, where store count rose 50 percent. In September, OCM cut its 2026 sales forecast from $2.6 billion to $2.0 billion, mainly because of better data and faster price declines. It stressed that unit sales keep rising.
The federal tax piece
Section 280E of the federal tax code bars businesses dealing in Schedule I or II substances from taking normal deductions, which squeezes margins and payrolls. On April 23, 2026, the Justice Department moved state-licensed medical marijuana and FDA-approved products to Schedule III, but adult-use cannabis, which is most of New York's market, stayed in Schedule I. A separate DEA hearing on broader rescheduling ran this summer (see our day-one coverage).
Update: October 2026
Broader rescheduling has stalled. On September 29, DEA Chief Administrative Law Judge Derek Julius stayed the proceeding while he considers a request by rescheduling opponents to add a GAO report to the record, NORML reported. DEA's response was due October 13. Until that is resolved, New York's adult-use employers remain under 280E.
In New York, hiring signals are mixed. Stores keep opening and the state held a free cannabis job fair in Albany in August. But falling prices are shrinking per-store revenue. Many of the newest employers are equity-licensed small businesses; see our look at how New York's equity program is performing. The next Vangst and Whitney report, typically released in late spring, will show whether New York's job growth held up in 2026.
Educational only, not financial advice. For adults 21+.