Pre-Employment Drug Screens Stigmatize Stoners Even in Legal States

When I do a little research into job ads and their pre-employment drug screening policies, it actually blows my mind a bit. I don’t think any job should require drug screenings. I’m a strong supporter of personal freedoms so long as they don’t cause harm.

For my personal experience, I have only had to deal with one pre-hiring drug screening, and I opted out of the job before I ever even had to do it. A few years back I was unexpectedly furloughed from my job at a university for three months and needed to find something on the fly to bring in a little money. I was a chef for about 15 years and always know I can get a job slinging food when I need to.

I applied to a downtown hotel as a full time oyster server — basically my job would be to stand there and schuck oysters for guests while talking to them about wine and food. I could do that in my sleep with one hand. I met with the executive chef and he wanted to hire me on the spot. Later he called and told me I would need to pass a drug screening. Luckily, my university job opened back up and I went back to work so I didn’t need the oyster job.

However, it has always struck me as odd that a menial job in an industry that is rampant with drug use is the only time I have been asked to pee into a cup. I have worked for large corporations, universities and the government in fairly integral roles that dealt with complex issues and confidential matters. Not one of these places has ever even requested a drug screening. Yet, to open an oyster, I needed to prove that I wasn’t some deranged pot head. Furthermore, the jobs that require drug screenings are often the lowest paying.

I decided to peruse Craigslist and see what types of jobs require drug screening. Keep in mind, I live in Washington with legal weed. That has loosened things up a tad, but now I’m seeing the phrase “must pass drug-screening (including marijuana),” on many ads.

A few examples of jobs that require marijuana drug screenings:

• Warehouse worker needed to load boxes on trucks, $10-$14/hour
• On-call job spooning food onto plates at a senior living facility, $13/hour
• Part-time job directing cars to parking spaces at special events, $12/hour
• Bellhop pushing bags on a cart to hotel rooms, $14$/hour

Funnily enough, I found a civilian job at a police station that payed $5k a month that did NOT require a drug screening.

Employers are choosing to take advantage of a loophole in the recreational marijuana laws and use cannabis as a means of filtering out stoners. Once weed goes legal on a national level, I sincerely hope that this practice ceases. It’s only fair. No employer ever asks or seems to care if the applicant gets blind drunk every night. Although, I would imagine that a fair amount of drug screening for labor/menial jobs has do to with liability insurance regulations.

I know a large amount of successful, motivated people who smoke a lot of weed and work for some of the biggest names in Seattle. Cannabis, like anything else in your life, is not a problem unless it is. Personal choice and discipline are still the purview of each individual. I say, if your employees are showing up on time, working well, and being kind to co-workers, who gives an elephant’s ass what they do on their own time?

I’m so tired of the unjust stigma that cannabis still carries. Hear me, potential employers: you are cutting yourself off from a lot of quality employees by refusing to consider anyone who uses cannabis.