President Obama and his administration have encouraged employers to conduct drug tests as background checks for their employment screening programs. The administration believes that employment drug tests will boost productivity in the work place and reduce healthcare costs.
As Corra Group provides drug testing background checks to its clients, we have experience in seeing how many potentially difficult employees can be filtered out from the hiring consideration. We have also seen where random drug tests can address productivity and compliance issues while reducing the safety of other employees. Let’s face it, people on drugs and using heavy machinery as part of their job is not a good idea.
According to the article in the Huffington Post…””While we believe that employers can use testing as one of a variety of tools to help guide employees suffering from substance abuse disorders into treatment –- which as we announced yesterday is not a moral failing but a treatable disease -– it is certainly not our policy that every employer in America ought to test and punish employees,” Rafael Lemaitre, spokesman for the administration’s Office of National Drug Control Policy, said in an email.
The U.S. Labor Department has not yet offered its guidance to states regarding drug tests. However, the practice of drug testing employees, especially those engaged in positions involving heavy machinery or sensitive areas, seems like a good idea to us.
