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SUGGESTED READING
With Smack, winner of the Guardian Prize for Fiction,
Melvin Burgess brilliantly sketches a gradual descent into drug
addiction. There is no preaching here, just the artful revelation
of cold, hard facts.
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Drug-Testing A Bad Investment
An ACLU Special Report Executive Summary
Driven by an industry-led panic that drug use is common -- even epidemic -- in America's workforce, employers today require tens of millions of American workers from all walks of life -- most of whom are not even suspected of using drugs -- to pass a urine test to get a new job or to keep the one they have.
Most employers, however, have never examined their programs to see if the investment is paying dividends through decreased accidents and absenteeism, and increased efficiency and productivity. The American Management Association reports that less than 10 percent of its members with drug testing programs have ever conducted a cost-benefit analysis.
Furthermore, respected scientific institutions such as the National Academy of Sciences have looked at the record and found little support for most of the drug testing industry's claims.
This special report by the American Civil Liberties Union presents an analysis of ten years of research and empirical evidence on drug use among workers, its impact on work performance, and whether drug testing is an effective tool for identifying drug abusers in the workplace.
Our conclusion:
the major research findings contradict the claims of drug testing's promoters:
- Based on results from the federal government's drug testing program, a study estimated that it costs $77,000 to find one drug user.
- "Lost productivity"...»»
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