Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Is It Right To Drug Test?


           
“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” (The Fourth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States)

This is part of the Bill of Rights, which protects all United States citizens against unreasonable searches and seizures, along with requiring a search warrant to be issued by a judge due to probable cause is a very controversial and sensitive topic of drug testing has challenged this amendment. According to Richard Glen Boire, in Drug Testing,
“The 2002 Supreme court decision to allow drug testing of all students who would like to participate in extracurricular activities is an attack on the fourth amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which guarantees a ‘reasonable exception of privacy. The ruling means that students can be treated like suspects without exhibiting suspicious behavior.”  Drug testing is a breach of the constitutional rights.
To put in a simpler term, they’re invading people’s privacy, through excessive costs to the individual and various companies. There should be no reasonable exception of privacy according to that amendment above. The ‘government’, so to speak,  is coming into schools and workplaces to pull out people to take urine samples to see if drugs are in their system. It’s a huge waste of money. According to Drug Testing, “The ACLU, it reports that in 1990 the federal government spent $11.8 million to test 29,000 employees only 153 whom tested positive – amounting to a cost of 77,000 to detect each positive drug user!”

Obviously, this is an outrageous use of government money. It’s a lot of money that we’re spending, just to find out if workers are on drugs. If drug testing continues on employees, it needs to be looked into a little harder and be spent on the people who are of harm in the workplace. Some can say that they absolutely love their job, and of those who do, I’m pretty sure it’s the older people whom have full time careers from attending a college and majoring in this career, so they are bound to love it and not worry about taking a drag to ease the boredom. Teenagers and young adults, who are in high school or just out of high school, are working to pay for college, work to get the money and typically don’t absolutely love their job.

Some drugs don’t even last the whole time you’re at work. Some drugs last a while longer and some just stay in your system for a while. It's the more important jobs that should be the jobs of choice where the workers are tested, such as, surgeons, doctors, bus or truck drivers, pilots, construction and home makers. Those are the ones who you trust your life with, which means those are the ones who should be tested more often than others. They have lives’ at stake while on their job, many lives in a day even.
Try being under the influence and flying a plane, or delivering a baby. I’m sure it’d be hard and all you’d want to do is laugh while up in the air and probably freak out while trying to deliver a baby.

In conclusion I feel drug testing is useless in some ways and simply put; a huge waste of money.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Should Workplace Drug Testing Be Allowed?

Pros: 
  • The surgeon operating on you, or other family/friends you know?
  • The bus or train driver, driving your child to school?
  • The truck driver tailgating you on the highway?
  • The airline pilot in control of your flight?
  • The person building your house?
  • The midwife delivering your baby?
Cons:
  • Workplace hierarchies and bullying -- which drug testing could exacerbate
  • Insufficient support in managing work related stress
  • Long shifts, particularly whose requiring disruption to normal sleep cycles
"Drug testing will continue top be employed on a widespread basis for the foreseeable future, as concerns over safety, productivity, and liability continue to trump privacy concerns in the minds of many business owners, executives and managers." www.answers.com/topic/drug-testing

Basically, drug testing will always still be used, and there will still be a huge debate over it. Some agree, some don't it's based on your beliefs.


How do you feel about Drug Testing? Do you agree with the pros or cons? I feel as if we should really look into drug testing a lot more and not waste as much money as we do, because out of all the drug test given out it's a little number of people whom are on drugs, according to Drug Testing "The ACLU, it reports that in 1990the federal government spent $11.8 million to test 29,000 employees, only 153 whom tested positive - amounting to a cost of 77,000 to detect each positive drug user!"



Seriously, we really need to re-think about all this money we're spending and how all of that money could of been spent.
I just feel like the testing on drugs shouldn't be taken so seriously unless you have s serious job. If you work in a hamburger shop, who cares but if you are a surgeon or pilot than check them, test them. they're the ones who will be putting others in real harm and they're the ones who have huge responsibilities while attending work each day. If you work at a hamburger shop your making simple food from simple instructions, you may be giving it to someone but if your high and making it it's pretty much a given that you'll do it right. But trying to fly a plane while on drugs could be very dangerous cause of hallucinations while on drugs or mood changes, you may not even want to fly the plane, you could all of a sudden decide to let go. That's pretty dangerous, but also a surgeon, not a good idea. A surgeon in charge of the open heart surgery of your loved one, whoa. You could have some troubles right there if they were under the influence while doing surgery.

Just to let you know what my point is, we need to test the important jobbed people to save more money for better use.