Under a new Florida law, people applying for welfare have to take a drug test at their own expense. If they pass, they are eligible for benefits and the state reimburses them for the test. If they fail, they are denied welfare for a year, until they take another test.
Mandatory drug testing for welfare applicants is becoming a popular idea across the U.S. Many states — including Alabama, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Louisiana — are considering adopting laws like Florida's. At the federal level, Senator David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican, has introduced the Drug Free Families Act of 2011, which would require all 50 states to drug-test welfare applicants.
32 comments:
I'm subject to random drug testing in order to keep my job? Why shouldn't welfare recipients be held to the same standard since a portion of my tax dollars are being given to them?
whats the problem?
many jobs require drug testing now
why shouldn't public assistance
I'm all for this , and excellent idea and I hope all the states adopt it.
If they fail, they should be incarcerated and placed on a work crew somewhere
Sounds like a "feel good" initative. If the cost outways the savings then the program is crap
Sounds like a "feel good" initative. If the cost outways the savings then the program is crap
August 29, 2011 12:58 PM
You are absolutely correct. And that is the case already in Florida which started this policy.
According to the article, they saved 240 dollars but had to pay out over 1,100. And yet to be decided, the costs in legal fees that they most assuredly will have to pay defending this law in court.
It is a feel good policy. It's popular and sounds like it makes sense but the facts do not support it.
Interesting article, both from the 4th amendment perspective (perhaps random drug testing should not be mandatory in the workplace either?) and from the cost benefit analysis.
In the end, I think upholding our 4th ammendment protection from illegal search and seizure outweighs the feeling of "getting back" at the deadbeats. Now, if a welfare recipient is arrested and found to be under the influence, their benefits should be stopped. That's different than assuming welfare recipient = drug abuser.
its not a 4th amendment violation
if you sign up for public assistance, then you know you have to be tested.
same as if you get hired at certain places, you know you will be tested.
The dope dealers father the babies by lots of different woman who then in turn live off the state forever. The men use them for free places to live and eat. A lot of these young woman are pawns to the men, heck some dont have the common sense to know they have pawned themselves. The cycle rolls on. You have generations of people that think it is normal.
1:23 PM
The author of the article, as well as the courts imo, would disagree with you.
Just because you know of a law or a common practice does not make it constitutional. Especially a new and untested law.
I am 100% in an agreement of this policy. I wish this law would come to Maryland.
1:19pm,
You need to visit some of the detention centers, jails and prisons to find out just how many welfare recipients are locked up for possession of and use of illegal and prescription drugs, along with prostitution. This is definitely one way may tax money is NOT wasted. I've worked for an organization for over 20 years and I am subject to drug testing. So should those who apply for welfare.
How can it all of a sudden be against the law for these folks but not for the working person who is subject to this anytime?
someone doesn't know what they are talking about?
Please explain this?
Pre empoyment even requires this in most cases now!
Did anyone read the article?
i read the article. i think that if those that work for a living are/can be subjected to random drug testing then those that DON'T work for a living should be as well. its kind of a double standard.
But as government policy, drug testing is being oversold. These laws do not do what their supporters claim. And more importantly: they are likely to be unconstitutional.
(See a TIME feature on your right to privacy.)
Drug testing proponents like to argue that there are large numbers of drug users going on welfare to get money to support their habits. The claim feeds into long-standing stereotypes about the kind of people who go on welfare, but it does not appear to have much basis in fact.
Several studies, including a 1996 report from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, have found that there is no significant difference in the rate of illegal-drug use by welfare applicants and other people. Another study found that 70% of illegal-drug users between the age of 18 and 49 are employed full time.
Drug-testing laws are often touted as a way of saving tax dollars, but the facts are once again not quite as presented. Idaho recently commissioned a study of the likely financial impact of drug testing its welfare applicants. The study found that the costs were likely to exceed any money saved.
That happens to be Florida's experience so far. A Florida television station, WFTV, reported that of the first 40 applicants tested, only two came up positive, and one of those was appealing. The state stands to save less than $240 a month if it denies benefits to the two applicants, but it had to pay $1,140 to the applicants who tested negative. The state will also have to spend considerably more to defend the policy in court.
Policies like Florida's will almost certainly end up in court — and there is a good chance that they will be struck down. The Fourth Amendment puts strict limits on what kind of searches the state can carry out, and drug tests are considered to be a search. In 1997, in Chandler v. Miller, the Supreme Court voted 8-1 to strike down a Georgia law requiring candidates for state offices to pass a drug test.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, writing for the majority, said that the drug testing was an unreasonable search. The state can impose drug tests in exceptional cases, when there is a public-safety need for them (as with bus and train operators, for instance). But the Fourth Amendment does not allow the state to diminish "personal privacy for a symbol's sake," the court said.
(Read whether schoolteachers should be drug-tested.)
Drug testing welfare applicants does not seem to meet the Chandler test since there is no particular safety reason to be concerned about drug use by welfare recipients. In 2003, the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down Michigan's drug testing of welfare applicants as a Fourth Amendment violation.
If Florida and other states are really concerned about drug use, they should adopt stricter laws and better enforcement policies aimed at the whole population, not just the most vulnerable. But these laws are not really about drug use. They are about, in these difficult economic times, making things a little harder for the poor.
If you read that, and understood it, I don't see how you can maintain your stance, logically.
I work, get a check and am subject to rendom drug testing. You don't work and I pay your check with no drug testing??? Where is the problem.
Random is the key word here. Any self-respecting deadbeat will know he or she has to be clean when their monthly drug test is scheduled. Make the testing random and at least make them worry a little before they get their free money.
I am a Florida resident and wholeheartedly agree with our Governor on this. Before I retired, drug testing was a part of receiving a paycheck for the job I held. And anytime taxpayer dollars are being handed out, there should be testing for drugs, and they are not being discriminated against. The problem must be that most of them can't pass the drug test!! Why else would they complain about it.
I was subject to random drug testing most of my 25 years in the military. If you failed it twice, you were gone. IMO it should be mandatory for every work place, and especially for welfare recipients.
Comprehension is non-existent from most of these commentors.
Just about everything that has been mentioned here has already been shown to be un-factual in the article.
They have published studies and court cases, the Supreme Court being one of them, that show it is in fact a violation of the constitution, namely the fourth amendment.
Exceptions are made for people employed in safety related areas to have to undergo drug tests.
I am not on welfare so it wouldn't affect me that way.
But I am concerned with violations of civil rights and the constitution, as I hope most of you are as well.
It has already been judged that drug testing of welfare recipients is illegal.
When the case of the one appealing gets to court, the State of Florida will be reminded of that.
Farmers get crop subsidies. Should they be made to undergo a drug test? lol
The stereotype that most people on welfare are drugs users is simply not true, according to this article and their sources.
You can disagree if you want but I will take the word of Time, the studies, state courts and the U.S. Supreme court over anything I have seen posted here.
the rich have legal prescriptions for their mind and mood altering drugs
they operate heavy machines like navigators and lexus's and make deals and pretend to be pundits doped up and delusional that god has blesses them with not just good fortune but righteous entitlement
There should be a mandatory drug test every time they get a welfare check.
any one that disagrees with this is just plain'ol stupid. like the majority here I think it's a great idea.
any one that disagrees with this is just plain'ol stupid. like the majority here I think it's a great idea.
August 29, 2011 8:50 PM
So you think the United States Supreme Court is stupid? lol. I think you and 'the majority', if that is even true, are using emotions rather than logic to base decisions on.
I used to think blacks were the most recipients of welfare until someone disagreed with me and I looked it up. Whites are on welfare more than blacks. (and please don't turn that into a race thing even though it sounds like it. It's not intentional. )
10:14
There are also more whites in the USA than there are blacks. There is a higher percentage of the population of black getting welfare verses whites.
Logic would tell us that if you want a hand out you must first prove it will not go towards funding your drug habit. If you have money for drugs you have money for food. It would also tell us that if you are using drugs and raising kids that puts the kids at a high risk to be an addict when they grow up.
10:14 Yes the supreme court is stupid! just look at the decisions it hands down! Most are biased at best! No one here other than you has mentioned race. We only want equal footing for all! Maybe random is the way to go !
Look it is simple and plain as this. If you can pay for your own drugs, by all means do whatever you want it is your decision. But if I am paying for your drugs I am going to be p-o'd so get a freaking job to buy y our own. If you aren't helping yourself why should others help you ?
And will someone, namely the moron going off on a rant for like 20 pages broken down, tell me why it is not "unconstituational" for me to be drug tested at WORK, but it is for those who have their hand out for what ever reason it may be? I am in no way shape or form saying that all welfare recipients are on drugs, but if you can pass the test why would you make such a big fuss? People want their cake and want to eat it too. That is exactly how this world has become. If I am being drug tested to earn my money that I am supposed to hand to you because you can not earn enough on your own, why should you not have to go through drug testing to recieve the money off of my sweat and hard work? Please why don't you look up some "facts" and "studies" on that, why should I pay for a drug habbit that is not my own?
If I went to work and told them I refused a drug test because it is "unconstitutional" they would laugh at me as they carried me and my stuff to the curb. I could understand if people had to pass a back ground check or something of that nature to earn benefits, but to ask someone to just do what is legal in order to get the benefits is crossing the line?
What I am hearing from majority of people who disagree with this law is:
A single women who won't or can't work regardless of ethnicity, can have as many babies as they want with one or more daddies; can collect a monthly welfare check. Meanwhile, the average husband/wife team, singles without kids, the elders, and people who work and pay taxes which is the majority of the middle class; have to foot the bill for these women and the men they sleep with.
I'm sick too death of this welfare/medicaid system.
Unfortunately for those of us who work hard, pay our bills, obey the law, don't have children we can't support, care about and help those who are helpless (not clueless), logic and fairness have nothing to do with what the courts decide is or isn't Constitutional. The real question, citizens, is whether or not it's Constitutional for the Fed to take our money at the point of a gun to give to someone who is too lazy and/or stupid to work. As far as the issue of drug testing a welfare recipient, I see no reason that a non-drug using person would object to such a test. However, it will never work. Anyone who has half a brain (and many of them do, else how would they cheat us out of our hard-earned money so artfully?) can beat most drug tests or at least can stop using in order to pass such a test to initially qualify, to continue receiving "benefits" or to re-qualify once he or she has been caught. Because we all know there would be second (and third and fourth and fifth, etc) chances. The only way to stop the thievery they are perpetrating upon us is to vote for officials who will fight to put an end to this redistribution of income. Many of us will not live to see this, but our progeny may reap the benefits of "hiring" real representatives of working Americans.
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