Explain SMBC — the wiki for Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

The Joke

A man in a lab coat is giving a tour to another man, saying "Oh my God! This place is so clean! So sterile! That's why you have to pay people to work here. We didn't do that in the old days, and you don't even let employees take home some of the merchandise? It's all bureaucracy now! Where's the SOUL?" The caption below reads: "Legalizing meth production really changed the business."

The Humor

The comic sets up what initially sounds like a nostalgic small business owner lamenting how modern corporate sterility has replaced the passionate, scrappy entrepreneurial spirit of the old days. Every complaint -- too clean, paid employees, no taking merchandise home, too much bureaucracy -- sounds like a generic "things were better before" rant that could come from any aging business owner. The punchline reveals that the "business" in question is methamphetamine production, which completely recontextualizes every complaint. The dirtiness was unsanitary meth lab conditions, the unpaid workers were drug addicts, "taking home merchandise" meant using the product, and the "bureaucracy" is basic health and safety regulation. The joke cleverly shows how the language of anti-regulation nostalgia sounds exactly the same whether you are talking about a craft brewery or a meth lab.