and no one irl even has the decency to agree with me because it’s so fucking drilled into the culture that these fucking BuNsInNesSes have a Right to do this because it’s a bSUsniEss. like oh yeah they have an office building so they definitely get to analyze my piss because they say they want to. sick fucking freaks.
preaching to the choir a bit on lemmy (or i would hope so at least) but still
I run a manufacturing business; you oversimplify.
Quite coincidentally my HR person came to me just an hour ago and told me that two people have complained of a coworker smoking on breaks and at lunch and being high on the job.
He drives a heavy forklift. Am I to ignore the situation? If I do I expose my employees to danger and my small business to lawsuits.
How are the employees that reported it supposed to react if I say “Whatever, that’s his business.”
To a large extent businesses have their hands tied by the rules and laws of society.
But what you are saying is probable cause. I think the OP complains about random testing without any justification.
In your example, even if you were not legally entitled to carry out a drug test, you could simply call the police and let them do the check.
Random drops are how you catch functionals before they fuck up and cost business.
Not really, the person could refuse and the cops can’t do anything unless it’s operated in public which most forklifts are not.
I’ve also worked a lot in heavy industry and if choices were. I’d rather have drug testing at an interval than not, and alcohol blow test every morning.
Narcotics, and alcohol, do not belong in the workplace and I dispise apologists. Then I’m also biased against since I’ve seen too many ruin their lives catching the next high or dying of it. A bit irrelevant to your post but it really rustles my jimmies.
Random tests could be fairer and avoid discrimination or prejudicial testing.
Random tests are used as discriminatory and prejudicial testing.
They are never actually random.
My union pays you $100 if you get hit with a random. They’re also the ones who issue them. Not my employer
This is kinda nice
That’s a very easily solvable problem
Unless your idea is to use a daily meeting where a d100 is rolled ro determines who is tested today in front of everyone you cannot really rule out any suspicion for bias.
You just came up with a single super simple way to do it. I’m sure there’s loads of other solutions that offer similar sort of randomness with more convenience.
And remember, we’re comparing this to people asking to be tested on a hunch. Do you not think these randomness measures are better for fighting bias and discrimination, or is the issue that you can’t have 100% always free of bias randomness?
Do you test your forklift drivers with breathalyzers too?
I guarantee you more of them are drinking before they go to work than getting high on break.
My business doesn’t test at all because I don’t care what my employees do when they’re not a work. I have no desire to get involved in their personal lives.
But just as with weed, If an employee told me that another employee was drinking on breaks and at lunch my hands are tied. I can’t ignore it.
You might hate this answer but I guarantee that man does better work when he’s high and that no danger of hurting anyone on the forklift.
That may be, but that absolutely will not fly if he does hurt someone.
Many of the drug tests don’t check for drugs currently in your system. Many of them are akin to checking your liver levels to see if you’ve had alcohol at all in the past week.
Also, what a massive straw man.
Sure…but it’s not on him. Realistically, there’s:
- The insurance company that has the restriction (required by law)
- Lawmakers that make the law putting anyone under the influence responsible for any accidents, and by extension the company for letting it happen (if they knew)
I wouldn’t necessarily blame this guy, but our elected officials. If anyone’s to blame, it’s mostly Republicans (and Democrats in the early 90s) for pushing these laws so hard.
Okay, see, now this is the sort of nuance that I think is good for the discussion!
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You’re being so naive. I can’t get involved in the personal lives of all of my employees, nor is it my place. I’m running a business, which from the sound of it you’ve never done. It takes a lot more effort than you seem to think. A lot.
Hell, in some ways it’s not even legal for me to ask about an employee’s personal life.
I treat my employees well. I have a chef on staff and they get a free lunch every day in a cafeteria. I pay competitively. I didn’t lose a single employee through the pandemic and have employees that have been with my company for 10-20 years. It’s a damn good place to work. Not every problem an employee has stems from a shit work environment.
Malignant task-master? Out of touch with reality? I know Leemy is anti-capitalism, but it may surprise you to learn that not every employer is rolling in profits and lighting cigars with 100 dollar bills. I work damn hard and have employees that have a higher take home pay than I do. Every day is a challenge.
An employer is not a therapist. No small business owner should have to play guidance counselor for their employees.
This was more common back in the days, but the issue is that it will result in societal inefficiencies like alcoholics not getting better. Best is nipping it before it gets a lot worse.
This is why in other countries there are a lot of responsibilities as an employer and they need to help with either private or public healthcare.
I’m going to guess that the “other countries” you mentioned also have functional and affordable health care systems?
Yes, my point was that it can be good for society to burden eachother too. Especially where we’re supposed to earn our daily living, look out for people
Give me a functional healthcare system and I’m down with assigning companies more responsibility.
In Sweden the responsibility comes first, the company are liable for the employee if they don’t take action and know about the substance abuse (for example). And I think the US at least had some laws prohibiting like that, but maybe I’m thinking of wrongful termination
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I imagine for the pay.
I appreciate my employers policy - you get one free pass if you attend therapy following a positive drug test. A second positive and you’re out.
We do randomly get tested regularly.
They are neither the fucking police, and here you are drug testing people
I don’t drug test at my business, but if two of my long-term employees come to HR and flat-out tell me that another of their recently-hired coworkers is smoking at breaks and at lunch my hands are legally pretty tied.
I can’t ignore it.
Are there criminal charges following a drug test?
No.
Bad example.
If negative drug tests are a condition for employment, you’ve agreed to them as part of employment. Being let go because you broke a condition for employment is on you.
You are welcome to find jobs where there are no drug tests, or start your own company with that ethos in mind.
They’re operating heavy machinery, not flipping burgers.
This reads like the world is 100% at fault for your personal problems.
This is a big reason why rational people grow out of the far-left academia: not everything is capitalism’s fault.
“Rational people grow out of far left academia” - what a provable statement this person said. Certainly doesn’t sound made up in the moment they were writing the comment.
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That’s an American thing.
This. In Canada, most drug testing is considered a violation of rights and freedoms because your employer should not have a say in how you live your life. There are exceptions for high risk jobs where an impaired worker could cause death by negligence.
Bingo. If my boss asked for my piss I’d go straight to HR. Americans put up with so much insane stuff when it comes to work.
Which is crazy when you think about all the people that migrate to the US for jobs/opportunity. Makes you wonder how bad it is in other places.
In some cases it is, yes, worse. But in many cases it’s just the press the Americans spew about themselves living in the “land of the free” while the jackboots march in unison ever closer.
I can understand the high risk jobs one and think that’s fair. In the town I grew up in some factories would do drug test as a way to fire people with cause instead of having layoffs. A few were more seasonal work, so once seasons changed and demand dropped then more drug testing started.
It’s also an insurance thing. Drug testing programs are expensive, but the insurance companies incentivize it with huge discounts. It turns out that people who do drugs are less accident prone and are usually a bit healthier too. This explains why US hospitals frequently test for tobacco use. It has nothing to do with the legality of use. This is why even with weed getting legalized many companies will still test for it.
People who do drugs are less accident prone?
And insurance is also the reason that you will have to pee for workman’s comp claims regardless of whether or not your company has a testing policy.
I would love to see the correlation between alcoholism and accidents. Bet that crowd is way more accident prone.
I guess, only the Us of America even.
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It specifically found the opposite in safety-sensitive positions.
My company does not do drug tests and never has. Someone asked the owner why and he said ‘Id lose a lot of good people’
Sounds like you work for a good company, at least with respect to drug testing.
They’re good people who take good care of me.
This is what companies used to be like and why people worked at a job for 40+ years
My current job and a different job I had, didn’t drug test people. Current job has a few stoners at the upper levels so they just don’t test people. The other company was very small, was mostly developers, and had a high bar for getting an interview, so they knew that also going “also you have to be clean” wasn’t a good idea to do to developers especially after recreational pot became legal.
Honestly I’ve seen a lot less dev jobs do drug testing since it whittles down too many otherwise perfectly competent employees.
I work in consulting so we often have to follow the rules that our clients impose on us. I once did IT work for a large utility company, who tested all of their employees since they have people operating heavy machinery and working in dangerous situations. One of the people that failed the test was the Client Engagement Lead (the highest ranked person on our project). Fortunately the client realized that IT workers don’t need to be held to the same standards as someone operating dangerous equipment and allowed them to retake the test.
Most recently, one of our clients thought we were drug testing our consultants but then realized we weren’t. So they told us we’d have to all get tested, even though many of us had been working for them for years. They, smartly, gave us a 3 week notice of when the testing would be.
I worked for one place like that. I worked in another place, in the same industry, where they decided to drug test all their employees one day. They lost everyone from 3rd shift, and everyone from 2nd shift except my supervisor and myself.
After that, they rapidly started to lose customers…
Did they really expect 3rd shift people to be clean lol
You should see how they do it in the service industry. No tests to get the job, but if you’re ever hurt at work and entitled to workman’s comp they give you a test and if you’ve smoked weed anytime in the last month the presumption is that you were high at work and not only do they not have to pay you for your injury but they just flat-out fire you.
The worker’s comp drug tests are such a disgusting example of late stage capitalism.
Imagine that you made a lot of money and lived comfortably off of the hard work of others. Then when one of those others got hurt while making money for you, you go out of your way to make sure you don’t have to help them cover the medical costs. Also, you take their only source of income away from them so they couldn’t even cover it themselves if they wanted to.
I can’t imagine being that heartless, and its literally just standard pretty much everywhere in the US. It is very saddening.
This is the intersection of two elements of our culture:
-
everyone must always do everything they can to make as much money as possible regardless of the consequences
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if someone uses drugs, they’re not a person anymore and it’s okay to hurt them as much as is within your power
-
This sounds like a talking point for the right about the “extreme” left. I don’t own a business but I also don’t expect them to foot the bill if I come to work drunk and it sounds pretty ridiculous to say they should. Saying addicts should get jobs and not worry about the consequences of coming to work under the influence is ridiculous. I’m all for helping people when they’re ready for help but giving them a pass for being reckless is too far.
A high person isn’t anymore dangerous than a sleep deprived person. Should they also be able to deny workman’s comp to someone for not getting enough sleep?
I agree that people shouldn’t go to work high or drunk, for the most part(honestly dont really care, I would judge my hypothetical workers solely on their work performance and behavior), but these tests catch substances used in the person’s freetime. An employer shouldn’t get to decide that just because someone got high in the safety of their home two weeks before being hurt on the job that they aren’t eligible for assistance. It’s pretty messed up.
I guess if they could somehow make a drug test that could test someone’s intoxication levels and tolerance at the exact time of the incident, then maybe it would be fair. Even then, they were hurt while attempting to make you money. I think it’s just the right thing to do, morally, regardless of the employee’s idiocy.
And yea I know, the right thinks any sort of empathetic idea is extreme.
A THC test with a short window is what’s needed but that’s specific to marijuana use. It’s wild that you don’t really care if someone comes to work high or drunk. In very real non hypothetical situations people can die or be severely injured if someone isn’t paying attention. Would you allow law enforcement to work under the influence?
I think it depends on the job, and if the substance problem is actually affecting their behavior and work performance. I think the focus should solely be on those 2 things, and not on whether the person uses drugs or not. Most people with serious alcohol and drug problems will have poor work performance, and that should be the thing they are judged for in that scenario.
There should probably be limits to professions like doctors, pilots, and drivers, in my opinion. The thing is that some drugs(in the right amounts) make people perform better at these jobs. Our pilots in the US military still carry meth pills with them for long missions. If I was on a long flight, I would definitely want the pilot to remain awake and aware the whole time. If a stimulant helps them with that, then I don’t mind.
As for law enforcement, I think they should be required to get high and relax, at least on their off time. Most of our killology trained cops seem to be in constant fight or flight mode with the public. They seriously need something to calm their nerves and ground them in between shifts, and right now, their go to is alcohol, which is worse than other drugs they could partake in.
If other lives depend on said job, then yea they should probably be tested. The vast majority of jobs are just meaningless drivel, though, and whether the employee does drugs or not shouldn’t matter.
Saying addicts should get jobs and not worry about the consequences of coming to work under the influence is ridiculous
that’s why no one is saying that. what we’re saying is that smoking weed a month ago shouldn’t cost you your job and your workmen’s comp if you get injured at work, and that this industry has used the drug war as an excuse to manufacture a system where absolutely none of the consequences of drug use are prevented but they can avoid paying people what they owe for forcing them to work long hours in unsafe environments under the guise of a “drug free workplace”.
This seems specific to marijuana but I fully agree that testing in a way that covers so much time and isn’t specific is unfair.
Trying to think of someone who works in the service industry that doesn’t smoke weed…
Yeah, they’re never paying comp.
That’s exactly the point.
Never get between a grift industry and it’s profits.
Like ok maybe drug testing someone who is driving/flying a bunch of people around…I kinda get it. Safety of the public etc.
But drug testing at an office job? Come fucking on. That’s political face. Nothing more.
Do companies really drug test office workers? I’m in the US, work in an office and have never been drug tested by any company I’ve worked for in the last 10 years
They are moving away from it. As they should. Most alcoholics and drug addicts are people that have the money to do so. Meaning they already work somewhere and haven’t been tested in ages. At least in my observation. There are the homeless with those issues, but I don’t think they are the ones applying to most jobs that are being talked about here.
But CEOs have a lot of responsibility. That’s why they deserve the high salaries. We can’t have them coming into work and dropping the stock price by making huge mistakes that effect all of the employees and stock- holders. So, yeah, drug testing.
Yes but that drug testing is to ensure that they keep their cocaine levels high enough. It draws concern if it gets to low and god forbid they gain perspective instead of acting like a drug addict looking for coins in the couch cushions.
Hard drugs also don’t show up on a drug test nearly as long as weed does, so you’re really only stopping people who smoked in the last month, while others are doing whatever.
I worked for a US company in the past and in my contract there was a phrase that I’m going to paraphrase. “Can be sent to unannounced drug tests (US only)”
This isn’t a worldwide issue.
Damn, América really is crazy. I wouldn’t accept such tests and I’ve never even tried drugs.
Depends what your job was. If you’re my 747 pilot I would be outraged if you refused a drugs test when asked.
There’s a time and a place for regulated drugs tests.
You know it’s all bullshit because they don’t/can’t test for alcohol dependence, which is way more devastating to a person’s productivity than cannabis.
My job breathalyzed me in addition to the piss test. I asked the attendant about the breathalyzer test, and she said that it’s common for people to fail it.
My biggest fear is failing one when I haven’t taken anything. I never have, but I know people who have. I’ve also known people who have passed after getting totally blitzed the night before. They are wildly inaccurate, aside from being an invasion of privacy.
I read, when you eat stuff with poppy seeds, some tests are false positive, because the plants are closely related.
opiates.
It’s stupid because most jobs are so fucking dull and easy, being on drugs is the only way to get any stimulation at them.
It’s especially frustrating as someone who needs cannabis for severe anxiety, because it’s anxiety inducing in itself to have to hide it and that pretty much cancels out the benefits for me- it’s something we absolutely need to destigmatize at work especially.
Please try therapy. Anxiety is curable with therapy, whereas meds or cannabis are temporary symptom relief, but the symptoms will always come back as soon as you’re sober.
And just like that, the entire American medical system, as well as kittnpunk’s mental health, began to heal!
Psychotherapy is the single most evidence-based treatment for anxiety, the literature stands up across the world. Not sure why you’re bringing the American medical system into this, but while we’re on the topic, our medical system absolutely encourages people to seek solutions in substances. Kittnpunk is saying they’re so anxious that they cannot function without being high. Psychotherapy can 100% help them decrease their reliance on cannabis to feel less anxious
Lmfao. Anxiety is curable with therapy is not a rule. Some anxiety is curable with therapy, but not all of it.
For example?
I have Generalized anxiety disorder, It’s chronic and therapy doesn’t “cure” it. I will most likely struggle with it for the rest of my life. While this may be an anecdotal example I’m not aware of anything that “cures” anxiety disorders, therapy is mostly there to manage the symptoms effectively. Therapy helped me understand and somewhat mitigate the problem, but it’s not something I can ever be rid of, and that’s how it is for a lot of people who have an anxiety disorder.
The last job I worked at said they reserved the right to drug test at any time. Thankfully they never did, because I use cannabis to treat pain for a rare nerve disorder and I would be in pretty serious pain all the time if I didn’t. But I was basically ready to stand up to them and say, “I’m not taking the test. I use cannabis. It’s legal one state over, which is where I buy it. I don’t get high when I’m working. If you want to fire me for it, have fun finding a new employee.”
Depends on the job. I don’t know that I want my kids teacher on meth, or an airline pilot on speed or whatever. Working in education and the aviation industry (and military) are the only times I’ve been required to take a drug test. Don’t know why it would be mandatory for certain industries. Like. Is my food not going to make it to the table from the kitchen because the waiter smoked a joint before his shift?
This is pretty much how it is in the US. If an employee’s drug use is a potential serious liability, most insurance companies require drug testing for them to insure you (generally, I can’t imagine companies want to drug test because it is actually quite expensive). Like in the construction industry, a lot of companies drug test because you really shouldn’t have someone on drugs operating heavy machinery and you sure as shit won’t get insured if you dont. I can’t speak to the companies that do it regardless of liability concerns but I work in an engineering position for a large company and no one is drug tested. In fact, no company I have worked for has drug tested.
Some private companies do regardless if the owners are religious. Otherwise it’s mostly big corporations, government, gov adjacent, or dangerous ie driving, construction, that kind of thing.
We need a better weed test though. It’s bad if someone is high while operating, but 2+weeks detectability is unacceptable.
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