New Florida Law: Drug Tests for Welfare Recipients

[Triewd]

Wow just wow.

Talk about demonizing people that are innocent (for the most part)

 

[Hygro]

Yeah generally the more prestigious and the better the pay, the less they test you, the less they make you fill out 117 page questionnaires, etc.

 

[civvver]

Hah, typical MobBoss condescension, and so typically untrue.

In my experience, the jobs that pay around minimum wage with long crappy hours and few benefits are the jobs that force you to piss in a cup. However, many jobs that pay $20 or $30+ an hour don't require a drug test at any stage of employment. Luckily for me, that's the kind of job that I have!

I think it's fairly logical actually, low skill jobs have high turnover thus if you can weed out less desirable candidates upfront you might increase the length of employment.

Second a lot of low wage jobs have greater physical demands or safety concerns than white collar jobs. Like someone working at a factory, if they come to work high they could injury someone. Or someone working at mcdonalds, if they contaminate food for example.

But I feel the same way about this issue as I do capital punishment, I'm fine with it in principle but it's not practical as the costs are far too high. I'm sure they could do a study easily and figure out how many people will have their welfare terminated and how much they would save their vs the cost of administering tests and it's going to be more expensive.

 

[JollyRoger]

I think it's fairly logical actually, low skill jobs have high turnover thus if you can weed out less desirable candidates

Florida needs to figure out how to weed out the less desirable candidates getting its governorships and legislative positions. Unfortunately, turnover doesn't seem to be a problem. Maybe they should hire a Palin.

 

[Formaldehyde]

It isn't logical at all to continue to spread the same old propaganda with no actual evidence to support it. Marijuana has been legal in Colorado for over a year now and there are no apparent wide-scale negative effects at all, much less a rise in the accident rates at work or people being poisoned at McDonalds.

People have been getting high at these sorts of jobs for ages with little or no negative effects whatsoever. McDonalds doesn't drug test as a general policy. But some overly reactionary and authoritarian franchise owners might do so, much like the rest of American businesses.

Having a beer, or two, or three, at lunch is vastly more dangerous. Yet millions of Americans do it every single work day.

 

[warpus]

I don't mind people getting fired when they show up high to work, that's just not acceptable. Or drunk.

What I mind is your employer caring if you do drugs on your own time. If it doesn't affect your performance and you don't have a public position which requires of you certain standards (exception: Toronto mayor), then it's really none of their business.

 

[Formaldehyde]

There is usually no way of knowing if someone is high at work unless you saw them smoking. If it doesn't affect their performance, why is it any different than having a beer at lunch?

When I was working on Wall Street, one programmer used to mix marijuana with his tobacco and roll his own cigarettes. People would walk by his cubicle and sniff the air. Then they would convince themselves that it couldn't possibly be pot they were smelling. He never did get caught. Some of the operators used a storage closet which was a lot more discreet.

Back then, if you walked by the NYSE at lunch time you would see a lot of the floor traders right outside the door on Wall Street smoking pot openly, much like the way people smoke cigarettes nowadays. They even wore their jackets with their name and the name of the company they represented on them. Nobody said a word.

 

[Arwon]

Smoking indoors? Eww.

 

[MobBoss]

Wow, I just realized this thread is really old. Rofl.

 

[Zkribbler]

What about people who get money from the state for disability, medicare/aid, dead veterans' families, firemen/policemen who get worker's compo for injuries sustained on the job, everyone who got that $300 tax rebate from Bush, etc? Logically, they should all get a drug tests too, shouldn't they?

Throw in boards of directors of corporatiions who get government subsidies and tax breaks. All federal legislators. Anyone who inherits tax-free money and property. Boards of directors of a media corporations who are granted free broadcasting licenses.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

There is usually no way of knowing if someone is high at work unless you saw them smoking. If it doesn't affect their performance, why is it any different than having a beer at lunch?

When I was working on Wall Street, one programmer used to mix marijuana with his tobacco and roll his own cigarettes. People would walk by his cubicle and sniff the air. Then they would convince themselves that it couldn't possibly be pot they were smelling. He never did get caught. Some of the operators used a storage closet which was a lot more discreet.

Back then, if you walked by the NYSE at lunch time you would see a lot of the floor traders right outside the door on Wall Street smoking pot openly, much like the way people smoke cigarettes nowadays. They even wore their jackets with their name and the name of the company they represented on them. Nobody said a word.

The main issue, as far as I can tell, doesn't apply to those Wall Street traders. I've worked in a lot of industrial environments, making a lot less money than Wall Street traders. Sometimes stuff happens, and people get hurt. The first thing the company wants to know when the employees get to the hospital is "who has gotten high in any period of time that shows up on the tests?" Guess what, it ain't because they care how badly damaged the employees might be.

 

[Formaldehyde]

Peeing in a cup, or even taking a blood sample, doesn't tell them anything in regard to smoking marijuana on the job. It just tells them if you have smoked in the last month or so. It is just another cop out. But I can certainly see why some employers would try to shift the blame onto employees with any accident where they were financially liable.

I've never worked in an industrial environment that was all that dangerous. There might very well be jobs where you simply can't be high and still be safe on the job. But I certainly don't personally know of many other than the obvious ones, like repairing cell phone towers which is supposed to be one of the most dangerous jobs in the country. That sounds like something where you really don't want to be high. But it certainly doesn't pertain to cutting someone's grass and trimming their hedges.

I know from personal experience that people can safely and competently perform as ambulance drivers and paramedics while stoned. Many of the people I worked with did so on a regular basis because they had to work 24 hour shifts. Part of their training included a specific test to assure they could handle it, because the managers knew from experience they would do so if they were pot smokers.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Peeing in a cup, or even taking a blood sample, doesn't tell them anything in regard to smoking marijuana on the job. It just tells them if you have smoked in the last month or so. It is just another cop out.

I've never worked in an industrial environment that was all that dangerous. There might very well be jobs where you simply can't be high and still be safe on the job. But I certainly don't personally know of many other than the obvious ones, like repairing cell phone towers which is supposed to be one of the most dangerous jobs in the country. That sounds like something where you really don't want to be high. But it certainly doesn't pertain to cutting someone's grass and trimming their hedges.

I know from personal experience that people can safely and competently perform as ambulance drivers and paramedics while stoned. Many of the people I worked with did so on a regular basis because they had to work 24 hour shifts. Part of their training included a specific test to assure they could handle it, because the managers knew from experience they would do so if they were pot smokers.

That was my point. The employer does not care if you were high on the job or high last night or high last week. All they care about is having someone they can blame for the accident...particularly if they can blame the injured person. "You want to sue us for having the blade guard removed from the saw that chopped your fingers off? The blood test from the hospital says you were smoking pot, which is against the drug free workplace policy you agreed to when we hired you. Talk to the hand...but better make it your other hand." "Now GTFO."