National ID with Biometric Data

[jotabe]

Because being tested for drug (mind-altering substance) usage when you apply for a job is such an over-the-top idea...

Just like being subjected to physical tests when hired by a sports team.

And even then, this has little to do with Big Brother... more like GATTACA.

[daPyr0x]

Because being tested for drug (mind-altering substance) usage when you apply for a job is such an over-the-top idea...

Actually it is. In my country, it is actually illegal to base employment decisions on the results of a drug test, and illegal to force an employee to undergo a drug or alcohol test, unless they are in a position where inebriation puts them in a safety concern.

Ignoring that, though; how is it my employer's business if I choose to smoke pot recreationally on my own time? I'll give you a hint - it's not. It's one thing if people are showing up to work intoxicated, or their personal choices are otherwise affecting their ability to work; it's something totally different a completely unrelated aspect of your personal life can cause you to lose a job or not get selected for one. Hell, even having a fully legal prescription won't save you (see link in previous post).

Do I agree that cokeheads and junkies are not the most employable people on the planet? Sure I do. Do I agree that hiring one inadvertently can cause harm to the business? Sure. Does that mean it should be assumed that because of how I choose to live my personal life, substances I choose to put in to my body, that I'm not responsible enough to separate my personal life from my work life?

And, no, this is not at all the same as physical tests when being hired for a sports team, these qualities directly reflect your job-related qualities, in the same way that the aptitude tests you're given upon signing up with a temp agency test your job-related qualities. Job-related is the important thing here - my personal life is not job-related.

[Satya]

If a person is qualified enough to be hired, and their choice to use a given substance is not apparent to the potential employer, why should the employer care? If the employee continues to do their job to the specifications required by the employer, and the employer would have no idea what the employee does in his/her off-the-clock time without a drug test, why waste time and money with a drug test? Recently there have been protests in my area at local Wal-Marts, because of a convergence of two events - a Wal-Mart store fired an employee with a serious, chronic medical condition for testing positive for marijuana: which he had a prescription for. I forget what he had, MS or something else incurable and painful. But I actually remember seeing the guy in the store. I could tell he had a medical condition, but did I suspect "drug" use? No. He obviously needed medication to do his job and live his life, and his doctor(s) decided cannabis was an appropriate treatment method. But because Wal-Mart has random drug tests for no good reason whatsoever, it fired a disable employee for testing positive for a prescribed substance. In addition, there was already a vote in Wisconsin regarding legalization, so it provided the pro-legalization side a boon to publicity and a poster-child for their movement - a sympathetic figure to exemplify unjust treatment.

[jotabe]

A person might be qualified enough to be hired, but it's natural for a contractor to want to screen which employees will be able to keep up over time and which ones won't. If a prospective employee decides to spend their time in a way that destroys over time their ability to perform a job, any job, it's the employer's business.
It's not your personal life. It's the substances you have in your body, and how they build up over time, and how they damage your tissues over time. Drugs don't clean up from one's body after using them, specially not after prolonged use (otherwise, they wouldn't be detected in a test).

Different matter altogether is discussing which particular drug has lasting effects or not. Maybe this drug should be screened and this other one is harmless and shouldn't: i won't get in there.

Prescription use of drugs is a non-issue (medicines are drugs, after all) here, precisely because it happens under medical control. It won't hurt you, and any side effects are a necessary evil balanced by the effect on your health and comfort. If a company fires you for taking your medication, they should be brought to a criminal trial for threatening your life.

[Satya]

On your last point at least, we agree. A person's medical treatment should be decided upon between a patient and a health-care professional, not an insurance company or employer.

But there are other points you made that I disagree with. "Drugs don't clean up from one's body after using them," - is a troubling generalization. You have no idea which substances might or might not impair a person's ability to perform a given job. If all you've got is personal opinion, I've got plenty of anecdotes of people who never did any 'substances' who were far less competent than some pot-smokers I know who are quite capable at their jobs. I also know a few alcoholics who's LEGAL drug (alcohol) severely impairs their ability to work - yet employers don't test for alcohol use.

[jotabe]

I have no idea about which drugs should, rationally speaking, be screened or not; that's why i said so in my post. Alcohol usage would be the first i would screen, were i an employer.

The fact still stands that, if the drug appear on your tests while you are at work (they won't screen you at your home, i guess we agree on that), it's reasonable to think there is a chance it will affect you. It's within reason, i think that an employer asks you not to enter your workplace with certain substances in your body.

I sure do have prejudices against drug users. But my prejudices usually go against alcohol and tobacco users a lot more than pot smokers. I don't think cannabis is nearly as harmful as the legal drugs.

[Jebus]

So Satya, you believe government should stop companies from screening employees and potential employees for drug use? I don't necessarily disagree with you, I just want to make sure this is your argument.

[daPyr0x]

The fact still stands that, if the drug appear on your tests while you are at work (they won't screen you at your home, i guess we agree on that), it's reasonable to think there is a chance it will affect you. It's within reason, i think that an employer asks you not to enter your workplace with certain substances in your body..

Really? Pot stays in there for 30 days. So, for 30 days after smoking pot I'm a good-for-nothing stoner because the influx of chemicals (naturally made chemicals that are little more than additions to chemicals your body already produces naturally) may affect me? I call bullshit.

I think we should screen out people who don't have a healthy romantic partner relationship in their lives. It's only natural to assume that someone without this quality will inevitably cause problems around the office (sexual harassment), and will eventually be so unhappy within their loneliness that they'll turn to alcohol, drugs, prostitution, or suicide. I mean seriously, if someone doesn't have a solid relationship by now, there's no guarantee this potential employee will be able to keep up to the demands of this job. If they can't run their personal lives to a standard I deem acceptable and proper, how can I expect them to run their business lives that way?

f*** off. Leave my personal life exactly as it is. Personal. I show up drunk, high, whatever; fire me, I deserve it. Hell, I'll even accept getting canned for showing up hung over, even though I'm technically not drunk, because regardless of that fact it's still irresponsible. But there's no way in hell I'm going to let someone tell me that I'm not capable or dependable with regards to my employment because of how I choose to spend my personal time.

[jotabe]

Really? Pot stays in there for 30 days. So, for 30 days after smoking pot I'm a good-for-nothing stoner because the influx of chemicals (naturally made chemicals that are little more than additions to chemicals your body already produces naturally) may affect me? I call bullshit.

If anything, think that a workplace is a private building. They don't have to let you in unless they are comfortable with you being there, if they feel you are a potential threat. If you don't agree with that, they can show you the exit door.

I think we should screen out people who don't have a healthy romantic partner relationship in their lives.

Do you think they don't do that already? Do you think the marital status part in the fill-in forms is innocent? Married with 1 or 2 children is the preferred status. Divorcees are screwed up usually, moreso than singles.

[daPyr0x]

If anything, think that a workplace is a private building. They don't have to let you in unless they are comfortable with you being there, if they feel you are a potential threat. If you don't agree with that, they can show you the exit door.

So now I'm a threat? Wow, amazing how we jump from "oh no, he smoked pot less than a month ago!" to "OMG HES GONNA KILL US ALLLLLL!!!!1!!oneone!!!!11!1!1!!" I choose to enjoy my personal time playing video games, filling my clearly very impressionable head with war, explosions, and violence. Am I more or less likely, than a pot smoker, to be a potential threat at work?

I'll give you a hint. IT DOESN'T MATTER. I choose to do what I choose to do on my personal time. I don't come to work with a joint hanging out of my mouth any more than I do with my 360 controller in my hands. If you want to determine whether or not I'm a threat, give me a personality test. That's a (slightly) more accurate picture of who I am and the risk any employer would be taking in hiring me than a test to say whether or not I smoke pot.

I think we should screen out people who don't have a healthy romantic partner relationship in their lives.

Do you think they don't do that already? Do you think the marital status part in the fill-in forms is innocent? Married with 1 or 2 children is the preferred status. Divorcees are screwed up usually, moreso than singles.

Wow, really? I had no idea. I always just ignored those sections (as is my right) along with the "visible minority" question. Maybe things are different in Spain, but here it is legally forbidden to make employment decisions based on such qualities. Not to mention horribly biased, inaccurate, and genuinely offensive to me.

[Jebus]

dap, out of curiosity, at what stage do you stop arguing like an angsty teen?

[jotabe]

Well, why do you think that gamers try to hide their status as such in the work environment?

In any case, you have your right to spend your free time any way you chose. But employers have the right to have their own prejudices and biases about what kind of people they expect to employ. It's their money in the stakes, after all.

but here it is legally forbidden to make employment decisions based on such qualities.

Well, i dunno how it is over there, but over here it's very hard to prove you have made an employment decision based on one criterium or other. And they don't usually write anywhere down "this guy has a great resume but he's a divorcee and single parent, so i'll hire this other one instead".

[daPyr0x]

dap, out of curiosity, at what stage do you stop arguing like an angsty teen?

When I run out of SERIOUS BUSINESS to argue about on the internet and have to deal with the real world.

But employers have the right to have their own prejudices and biases about what kind of people they expect to employ

Law here prohibits that sort of thing... There is no right to being prejudiced.

From the Canadian Human Rights act:

3. (1) For all purposes of this Act, the prohibited grounds of discrimination are race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, age, sex, sexual orientation, marital status, family status, disability and conviction for which a pardon has been granted.

7. It is a discriminatory practice, directly or indirectly,
(a) to refuse to employ or continue to employ any individual, or
(b) in the course of employment, to differentiate adversely in relation to an employee,
on a prohibited ground of discrimination.

And, from the Human Resources department of this country;

The Canadian Human Rights Act prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability and
perceived disability. Disability includes those with a previous or existing dependence on
alcohol or a drug. Perceived disability may include an employer’s perception that a
person’s use of alcohol or drugs makes him or her unfit to work.
The Commission will accept complaints from employees and applicants for employment
who believe they have been dismissed, disciplined or treated negatively as a result of
testing positive on a drug or alcohol test. Workplace alcohol- or drug-testing policies
that contain discriminatory elements may also be the subject of complaints.
Because they cannot be established as bona fide occupational requirements, the
following types of testing are not acceptable:
• Pre-employment drug testing
• Pre-employment alcohol testing
• Random drug testing
• Random alcohol testing of employees in non-safety-sensitive positions.

There are no rights.

[locke]

I think we should screen out people who don't have a healthy romantic partner relationship in their lives.

Do you think they don't do that already? Do you think the marital status part in the fill-in forms is innocent? Married with 1 or 2 children is the preferred status. Divorcees are screwed up usually, moreso than singles.

Wow, really? I had no idea. I always just ignored those sections (as is my right) along with the "visible minority" question. Maybe things are different in Spain, but here it is legally forbidden to make employment decisions based on such qualities. Not to mention horribly biased, inaccurate, and genuinely offensive to me.

Of course they screen for this, in my field, editors with kids are more likely to be hired than editors who are without kids and married editors are more likely to be hired than unmarried editors. slightly different for assists, I've used my singleness as an asset before in an interview: "oh and I don't have a girlfriend, so I won't have anyone bitching about my working a graveyard shift." Graveyard being 7pm to 5am typically. assistant editors who are married, though rare, are highly employable because they usually try harder because they want to move up, are less likely to be potheads or gamers, and they'll be a lot more loyal, even as freelance, than unmarried assists. They're also more likely to be promoted, because an employer knows that an investment in promoting a married person will yield a longer term with them after promotion than a promotion of an unmarried person, who is more likely to go get a job somewhere else after being promoted.

This is why the EASIEST time to get off, no questions asked, is to get off to go attend a friend or family's wedding. They want you going to those things, keep it on your mind.

[Rei]

Do you think the marital status part in the fill-in forms is innocent?

That is actually an illegal question in Canada. A potential employer may not ask what your marital status is, your sex, your sexual orientation, religion, etc. Now, of course, some are not aware of this, and some probably blatantly ignore it, but such questions are technically illegal and they are not allowed to ask them.

[Gravity Defier]

Do you think the marital status part in the fill-in forms is innocent?

That is actually an illegal question in Canada. A potential employer may not ask what your marital status is, your sex, your sexual orientation, religion, etc. Now, of course, some are not aware of this, and some probably blatantly ignore it, but such questions are technically illegal and they are not allowed to ask them.

Same here, at least in AZ though I assumed it was nationwide.

[daPyr0x]

Do you think the marital status part in the fill-in forms is innocent?

That is actually an illegal question in Canada. A potential employer may not ask what your marital status is, your sex, your sexual orientation, religion, etc. Now, of course, some are not aware of this, and some probably blatantly ignore it, but such questions are technically illegal and they are not allowed to ask them.

Many organizations do continue to ask these sort of questions, however they very clearly indicate that filling it out is optional and will not impact your employment status, that it is merely used for accountability purposes (many companies have "diversity targets" they strive to attain).