Targeting Poor and Unemployed for Drug Problem distracts from growing Employee Drug use Problem.

Here's something I'm still wrestling with. The unemployed and underemployed must now be tested, treated and drug-free, to receive food stamps (eventually BadgerCare). The excuse? Employers are unhappy with unreliable drugged out applicants. So businesses talked their compliant Republicans political servants into making taxpayers pay for drug testing, so they don't have to; WPR:

With low unemployment, some companies are finding it difficult to find suitable workers. And finding ones who are drug-free can add an extra challenge ... some companies have half their new hires fail a drug test and some companies are considering whether to continue screening.

So one group must be utterly clean, while the other group is becoming more addicted and costing businesses too much to continue drug testing? The poor are being stigmatized while drug-using employees are becoming a bigger and bigger problem?

New data analyzing employee drug test results have been released ... Data shows that between 2016 and 2017 the nation has seen major increases in positive test results for cocaine, methamphetamine, and marijuana ... positive test results for meth went up 167 percent in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio ... 4.2 percent of workers tested were drug positive in 2017. In Wisconsin it was 4.8 percent.

Employers are actually afraid to drug test their employees because replacing them would be difficult:

"Every client meeting we go to we have companies that aren’t CDL (commercial drivers license) so they aren’t technically required to test, questioning if they should because they can’t get good (job candidates) to pass the drug screen."

Legalized Marijuana a big drug testing problem companies are suddenly confronting:

Samantha Devore, who oversees drug testing at Bellin Health for trucking firms, said, "We have companies ask us flat out 'Is there a test that doesn’t include marijuana?' The U.S. DOT will never allow illegal substances to be accepted in their drug panel and in most states it is still an illegal drug."

No surprise, Democrats are also on top of this problem:

Recently a bill was introduced by Rep. David Bowen, D-Milwaukee, that would ban marijuana testing for most jobs.

Cash Aid to the Poor Huge Success!!!

I keep coming back to something Milton Friedman once proposed, a minimum income tax check to every American earning under a certain amount. He called it a negative income tax. It was crazy right? Here's Friedman's thinking:

Friedman's experiment would be impossible to pass legislatively, since Republicans are going in the opposite direction, making it almost impossible to get support by requiring drug tests, work requirements and time limits.

Kenya and Zambia Leading the Way: A variation of Friedman's idea is now taking off, slowly, but showing surprising success. Still, there are those who still think the waste factor and lazy people will make the whole thing impossible to carry out. There's a hope that two successful program experiments in Kenya and Zambia might start changing peoples minds. Here's the audio from NPR:

GiveDirectly announced that it will give every adult in this impoverished village in Kenya an extra $22 each month for the next 12 years — with no strings attached. The money is wired to bank accounts linked to each villager's phone.

GiveDirectly has actually been advocating for this kind of cash aid for the past decade. Founded by four grad students in economics who wanted to challenge traditional aid, the charity has already given $65 million to people across Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda, provided by a mix of Silicon Valley foundations and ordinary citizens who contribute through GiveDirectly's website. And GiveDirectly has shown through rigorous, independent study that people don't waste the money.

Some of the world's foremost researchers of anti-poverty strategies will be doing an independent study of the data that emerges.

 Zambia:

Zambia recently ran a bold experiment: Instead of giving poor people traditional aid — seeds, or a cow or job training — officials handed out cash, with no strings attached.

Kenya:

GiveDirectly wants to see what happens when you give extremely poor people a much longer runway — a guaranteed "basic income" they can count on for years. Michael Faye, the chairman of GiveDirectly, says they've chosen to set the payment at $22 because in Kenya $22 per person per month is "the food poverty line — the amount of money it would take to afford a basic basket of food for yourself."

Walker's presidential strategy portrays Minimum Wage Work Force as Unreliable Employees taking Drugs.

The latest Republican attack on the lower and middle class is the ugliest and most degrading one yet, hoping to justify low wages for everybody not lovably wealthy.

First, you have to believe the poor and middle class aren't interested in showing up for work every day. And they wonder why they’re getting minimum wages.

    

Second, you have to believe their drug habit is keeping them from getting a higher wage job.

Enter Scott Walker, who’s running for president on these two important divide and conquer points, highlighted below:

Governor Scott Walker: “As I traveled my state, I hear employers, small business owners say, overwhelming: ‘We have jobs. We just need workers. And we need two things: people who know how to show up every day for work, five days a week, and gimme someone who can pass a drug test.'”

But I challenge anyone who believes this, to rationalize away the the example below, which is a typical situation for most low income workers:

For Wisconsin workers who currently depend on public assistance, like 21-year-old Milwaukee waitress Peyton Smith, the burden of the law would be much more personal.

“For [Governor Walker] to put another barrier in front of us is like saying we’re guilty, but we’re not guilty,” Smith told ThinkProgress. “It’s already hard to go down there and file for government assistance. We have to report in every day, fill out papers. Now I have to take the time out of my busy schedule to take a drug test? Come on!”

Smith, who has a three-year-old daughter and another baby due soon, works about 20 hours a week at Denny’s — though she has repeatedly requested full-time employment. Because it’s a tipped job, she makes just $2.33 an hour, and currently relies on food stamps to feed her family.

“I’m willing to work. I’m not lazy at all,” she said. “But the jobs we can get are horrible, low pay, and we can’t get the hours we need. As a parent, it just sucks. I want things that are healthy for her, but the fruits and vegetables she needs to grow as young child are expensive.”

And yet, Smith will get Walker's drug test, because it's all part of the plan to define her as an unreliable employee and lazy drug addict who deserves to be on a minimum wage. A hike in the wage will only encourage her. She's where she belongs:

Jennifer Epps-Addison with Wisconsin Jobs Now ... accused the Governor of “stigmatizing the hardest working people in our economy. "There were times even I couldn’t navigate the process, as a law student with a college degree. The system is set up to disempower people and make them frustrated enough to give up before receiving the help they need.”

And of course, our pocket conservative constitutionalists are not deterred by...the constitution:

Courts have ruled that similar mandatory drug testing programs imposed by other states and the federal government were unconstitutional.

Walker phasing out Welfare, FoodShare, Medicaid and Unemployment with bogus screening Questionnaire.

Republicans have found a way to make us lose every one of our safety nets. And what will happen to the people and families who need public assistance. It's anybody’s guess. 

Scott Walker is now requiring a drug test for all public assistance programs, against federal law, and offered this Orwellian explanation:

Walker: "We're not making it harder to get government assistance, we making it easier to get a job."

Two completely different goals. Walker inadvertently acknowledges that it will make getting government assistance harder by arguing that it doesn't. From WKOW's Greg Neumann:

The Wretched Democratic Response? You'll want to put your fist through the monitor with their comeback:

Rep. Peter Barca: "We look forward to the debate, I trust the process will be fair (giggle). I'm not so sure we'll agree to the outcome." 

It turns my stomach.

A similar Montana bill making the rounds nationally and now in Wisconsin, looks like this:

The bill would require anyone who applies for government assistance under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program to go through a drug screening. TANF provides temporary financial assistance for pregnant women and families with one or more dependent children. The program offers financial assistance to help pay for food, shelter, utilities, and expenses other than medical.

Yes, even pregnant women will be tested. I doubt you can get any lower than this.

Surprise, according to your Questionnaire, there's a "Reasonable Likelihood" you're Taking Drugs: In the GOP's Montana bill, applicants must willingly give up personal information to the government or risk “raising suspicions” about possible drug use. Sound coercive and an easy way to suspect anyone? Not to the rightwing authoritarian Republican Reich:

Applicants must answer a questionnaire called the Substance Abuse Subtle Screening Inventory (SASSI) to determine the "likelihood of having a substance abuse disorder." If results indicate a "reasonable likelihood" of drug abuse, the applicant would be required to undergo a lab test with the state.

And what if you fight back against having your privacy invaded by big government…

Failure to complete the questionnaire and/or drug test would result in the applicant being denied benefits.

Which is the intended result, and a pretty tricky way to defeat opponents. Big government Republicans will also dump taxpayer money into a new privatized bureaucratic hoop:

In cases where a person is deemed ineligible for assistance, a third party would be authorized to accept payments for children whose parents are ineligible for benefits.

The right wings avowed enemy, the ACLU, made this persuasive argument:

The American Civil Liberties Union of Montana argued that because the people who receive government assistance are by definition low-income earners, this bill treats them like criminals before they even apply for financial assistance. In December 2014, the 11th Circuit US Court of Appeals ruled that Florida's enacted version of this bill was unconstitutional and "suspicionless drug tests violates the Constitution's protection against unreasonable government searches."

Isn't it about time freedom loving Republicans challenge another constitutional protection? And because many readers don't get to see the comment section, here's one I thought was to important to not include:

lufthase: The Substance Abuse Subtle Screening Inventory mentioned above is a specific proprietary screening tool created and owned by the SASSI Institute. Because they're actual health practitioners and not RW ideologues, they have this to say about using their screening test like this:

"To use the SASSI to discriminate against individuals, such as disqualifying job applicants or to deny public assistance, violates the purpose of the SASSI and is a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act."

and…
"…when public assistance is made contingent on participation in the assessment and treatment process, it increases the risk for violations of ethical principles and applicants’ rights."

The folks who wrote the damn screening test (and stand to profit from its use) say this is not a legitimate use of their test. Shout it from the mountaintops!

Drug Test Welfare Recipients: Constitutional Conservatives push unconstitutional agenda.

The constitution means what Republicans think it means, or should mean at the time.

Foxnews: Conservatives who say welfare recipients should have to pass a drug test to receive government assistance have momentum on their side ... Mitt Romney saying it's an "excellent idea."

Nearly two dozen states are considering plans this session that would make drug testing mandatory for welfare recipients, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. And Wyoming lawmakers advanced such a proposal this week.

Driving the measures is a perception that people on public assistance are misusing the funds and that cutting off their benefits would save money for tight state budgets -- even as statistics have largely proved both notions untrue.

"The idea, from Joe Taxpayer is, `I don't mind helping you out, but you need to show that you're looking for work, or better yet that you're employed, and that you're drug and alcohol free,"' said Wyoming Republican House Speaker Ed Buchanan on Friday.

Even after the courts have already ruled on the unconstitutionality of the law, the right wing oddly expects a different result. What is that the definition of...hmm, I wonder.

Supporters are pushing the measures despite warnings from opponents that courts have struck down similar programs, ruling that the plans amount to an unconstitutional to search of people who have done nothing more than seek help.

Ohio Democratic State Rep. Robert Hagan Blasts Drug Testing for Welfare Benefits, Suggests same test for Legislators, judges...

Ohio is producing some very combative Democratic legislators, like Rep. Robert Hagan.

Rachel Maddow doesn't have to say a word, as Hagan tears his states Republican legislators apart, for their drug testing harassment of Americans hit hard by the Great Recession. If only Congressional Democrats could be this passionate about the jobless.