420 with CNW — More Companies Stop Preemployment Marijuana Tests as Legalization Spreads
Employers are opting to do away with drug screening tests amid a major labor shortage that has caused a deficit of around 3.5 million workers in the workforce. The transportation industry has been especially affected by the labor shortage, with employers in the sector struggling to find enough warehouse personnel, public transit workers, couriers and truck drivers. The food and hospitality industries as well as health care and retail trade have also been grappling with worker shortages for a while.
Some companies are now choosing to stop marijuana screening tests for new potential employees as they can reduce the worker pool by a wide margin.
With nearly one-half of Americans living in states that allow recreational cannabis sales and even more residing in states with medical marijuana markets, plenty of Americans are using cannabis either recreationally or for medical purposes. But since cannabis is still illegal at the federal level, employers are allowed to screen employees or potential workers for cannabis and either dismiss them or decline to hire them if they fail a drug test.
Drug test company Quest Diagnostics reports that 4.6% of the tests it carried out in 2021 were positive for marijuana, the highest in 20 years. This was a nearly 50% increase from the 2.7% of drug tests conducted in 2020 that tested positive for marijuana. However, the number of firms screening for cannabis has reduced by 10% in states with legal cannabis markets.
It seems more companies are choosing to eliminate pre-employment drug tests in an effort to fill up their ranks. Companies are desperate to keep remaining workers and hire new ones in a labor landscape that has been termed the Great Resignation due to the voluntary resignation of 47.4 million employees in 2021.
Amazon announced that it would stop testing for cannabis in June 2021, and a 2021 survey from staffing company Manpower Group revealed that at least 9% of 45,000 companies were thinking of eliminating pre-employment drug screenings.
According to employment attorney Bernard Tisdale, companies that would like to stop testing for marijuana first have to go through a complex checklist such as whether it is a safety-sensitive position or a federal contractor. Tisdale says that some of his clients have stopped testing for cannabis in low-skilled job applications as this made it harder to fill the positions. He added that employers who don’t test during the hiring process still have the right to screen for cannabis if an employee is showing clear signs of impairment at work.
As drug-testing rules are relaxed by employers, more people could become comfortable consuming marijuana products, and that could indirectly boost manufacturing activity in several niches, such as the production of indoor cultivation equipment by enterprises such as Advanced Container Technologies Inc. (OTC: ACTX).
NOTE TO INVESTORS: The latest news and updates relating to Advanced Container Technologies Inc. (OTC: ACTX) are available in the company’s newsroom at https://cnw.fm/ACTX
Please see full terms of use and disclaimers on the CannabisNewsWire website applicable to all content provided by CNW420, wherever published or re-published: http://CNW.fm/Disclaimer
Employers are opting to do away with drug screening tests amid a major labor shortage that has caused a deficit of around 3.5 million workers in the workforce. The transportation industry has been especially affected by the labor shortage, with employers in the sector struggling to find enough warehouse personnel, public transit workers, couriers and truck drivers. The food and hospitality industries as well as health care and retail trade have also been grappling with worker shortages for a while.
Some companies are now choosing to stop marijuana screening tests for new potential employees as they can reduce the worker pool by a wide margin.
With nearly one-half of Americans living in states that allow recreational cannabis sales and even more residing in states with medical marijuana markets, plenty of Americans are using cannabis either recreationally or for medical purposes. But since cannabis is still illegal at the federal level, employers are allowed to screen employees or potential workers for cannabis and either dismiss them or decline to hire them if they fail a drug test.
Drug test company Quest Diagnostics reports that 4.6% of the tests it carried out in 2021 were positive for marijuana, the highest in 20 years. This was a nearly 50% increase from the 2.7% of drug tests conducted in 2020 that tested positive for marijuana. However, the number of firms screening for cannabis has reduced by 10% in states with legal cannabis markets.
It seems more companies are choosing to eliminate pre-employment drug tests in an effort to fill up their ranks. Companies are desperate to keep remaining workers and hire new ones in a labor landscape that has been termed the Great Resignation due to the voluntary resignation of 47.4 million employees in 2021.
Amazon announced that it would stop testing for cannabis in June 2021, and a 2021 survey from staffing company Manpower Group revealed that at least 9% of 45,000 companies were thinking of eliminating pre-employment drug screenings.
According to employment attorney Bernard Tisdale, companies that would like to stop testing for marijuana first have to go through a complex checklist such as whether it is a safety-sensitive position or a federal contractor. Tisdale says that some of his clients have stopped testing for cannabis in low-skilled job applications as this made it harder to fill the positions. He added that employers who don’t test during the hiring process still have the right to screen for cannabis if an employee is showing clear signs of impairment at work.
As drug-testing rules are relaxed by employers, more people could become comfortable consuming marijuana products, and that could indirectly boost manufacturing activity in several niches, such as the production of indoor cultivation equipment by enterprises such as Advanced Container Technologies Inc. (OTC: ACTX).
NOTE TO INVESTORS: The latest news and updates relating to Advanced Container Technologies Inc. (OTC: ACTX) are available in the company’s newsroom at https://cnw.fm/ACTX
Please see full terms of use and disclaimers on the CannabisNewsWire website applicable to all content provided by CNW420, wherever published or re-published: http://CNW.fm/Disclaimer
