Drug Test for Unemployment Benies.

AspenValley wrote: The second argument, is that you are supposedly willing to give up privacy rights to accept unemployment insurance benefits. I guess that would make some sense to me if there was some actual, plausible, necessary reason to violate someone's privacy other than doing it just because you can. Do we drug test people who are seeking to collect insurance benefits when they dent the fender of their car?

The second one would be to ensure that they are eligible, according to the legal restrictions on receiving the charity, to receive the charity dispensed from public funds. Shall we not make sure they are unemployed before allowing them to receive benefits? Shall we not check to make sure that the reason they are unemployed was that they walked off the job rather than being let go?

There are requirements to receive public charity - any public charity. What those requirements are is determined by the citizens and their duly elected representatives. If it is determined that one of the requirements is that no evidence of illicit or illegal drug use is present before the charity is distributed, then that is a requirement that must be met before one receives the charitable subsidy of their fellow citizens. If it is determined that one can not have voluntarily decided to become unemployed to receive the charity subsidy, then that too is a requirement that must be met before receiving the charitable subsidy. No one is entitled to charity, public or private. You have no right to the charity of others.

Your fellow citizens do not owe you food for your belly, clothes for your back, a roof above your head, a cell phone, utilities, medical care or anything at all to ensure your continued existence. You do not have a right to the fruits of the labor of anyone other than yourself. You have no right to require someone provide you a good or a service without compensation for their efforts. If the citizens and their elected representatives desire to reduce the prevalence of illicit and illegal drugs in their community by denying their charity to those that indulge themselves in such desires, that is their right to do so - it is their money that is being dispensed - the fruits of their labor - they have the right to decide who is and who is not eligible to receive their charity. If they decide that their charity shall not be used to purchase alcoholic beverages or tobacco products, they have the right to place that restriction on the use of their money being dispensed for charitable purposes. One more time - no one has a right to the charity of another.

posteryoyo wrote: At 2%, that means that the people on welfare take less drugs than just about anyone in Fla.

Yes, that's EXACTLY what it means... And the GOVERNOR'S OWN NUMBERS confirmed it. Thank you.

LadyJazzer wrote:

posteryoyo wrote: At 2%, that means that the people on welfare take less drugs than just about anyone in Fla.

Yes, that's EXACTLY what it means... And the GOVERNOR'S OWN NUMBERS confirmed it. Thank you.

So what? I don't want 2% getting benefits if they are drug users.

How about in CO where likely 60-90% are drug users, that's the general population, don't many of them get all kinds of payouts? School education, unemployment, plowing, etc. I know many CO teachers that take drugs, we pay them a lot to teach the kids whilst they are high. Would you be ok with a drug test and if someone on your road fails, no plowing...or no police protection or no firemen...no access to hospitals...just wondering where the line is?

Mind you, I would have people self or family insure for unemployment, in fact we can use the new health care model for unemployment insurance and just make people buy it on the private market and then the private companies will show you if it is important, if they do it. We can use that for public education and food too.

LadyJazzer wrote:

posteryoyo wrote: At 2%, that means that the people on welfare take less drugs than just about anyone in Fla.

Yes, that's EXACTLY what it means... And the GOVERNOR'S OWN NUMBERS confirmed it. Thank you.

Your welcome.

LadyJazzer wrote:

posteryoyo wrote: At 2%, that means that the people on welfare take less drugs than just about anyone in Fla.

Yes, that's EXACTLY what it means... And the GOVERNOR'S OWN NUMBERS confirmed it. Thank you.

Lord I just love "progressive" hyperbole. Someone wants to take a sample of one area of Florida that includes40 people, 6 weeks into implementation of the program and use the products of that sampling to make a hyperbolic leap where those results can be applied across the entire state. Simply amazing. There are a couple of problems with attempting to do this of course, and both the author and LJ are simply hoping you lack the intelligence to find the faults. Fortunately for the union, most of us are not nearly as unintelligent as "progressives" believe us to be.

The first problem, of course, is the size of the sampling. 40 individuals are not nearly a large enough sampling to support the broad, sweeping conclusions that are liberally drawn from the available data. It might be properly seen as preliminary, but that's about the extent of its usefulness in answering the question.

The second is that these 40 individuals applied after the implementation of the law, which was highly publicized and touted in not only Florida, but the national press. If you knew you had been using drugs, would you go pay money to take a test you knew you were going to fail? I would have to say that the 2% failure rate is more indicative of the common sense possessed by the population in Florida than it is the rate of drug usage by the population of Florida.

Third, this sampling came from one area of Florida, hence the numbers coming from the Department of Central Florida (DCF). Does the DCF include Miami? I'm betting not. Might the rate of drug usage in the population be higher in Miami than it is in the agricultural and ranching areas of Florida? Why are only DCF numbers provided? Have the departments in other areas of Florida not released any numbers or do their numbers fail to provide the spin that the "reporter" wished to provide in their article? Unfortunately, we have no way of knowing - numbers from other areas of Florida were not provided, nor their absence accounted for, by the "reporter" of this "news".

Fourth, there is no comparison given as to whether the 40 individuals that applied in the central Florida region represents an average, an increased, or a decreased number of individuals that applied for benefits over that period of time. If the average number of applicants prior to the law over a similar span of time was 100 and is now 40, might the program be saving significantly more than what is represented by denying the benefits to the 2% that failed their drug test?

Nothing can be gleaned from LJ's source of any use to those seeking honest answers to the question of whether Florida's law is saving, or costing, the state money.

Gee, I'd love to give you more statistics....but as expected, it's been blocked by a judge as possibly unconstitutional...(as expected).....

Judge Blocks Florida's New Welfare Drug Testing Law

Orlando – A federal judge temporarily blocked Florida's new law that requires welfare applicants to pass a drug test before receiving benefits on Monday, saying it may violate the Constitution's ban on unreasonable searches and seizures.

Judge Mary Scriven ruled in response to a lawsuit filed on behalf of a 35-year-old Navy veteran and single father who sought the benefits while finishing his college degree, but refused to take the test. The judge said there was a good chance plaintiff Luis Lebron would succeed in his challenge to the law based on the Fourth Amendment, which protects individuals from being unfairly searched.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/10 ... z1g3poGshY

We'll see if it survives legal challenge... I doubt that a longer trial will produce results that are any different. The assumption that people on welfare use drugs at a rate any different than any other segment of society is just the usual racist b.s. ... (Oh, yeah, they're all black or hispanic, too... and probably a bunch are illegals... I know, because the WorldNutDaily and NewsMax told me...)

So laughable - unreasonable search. I guess verifying that the applicant was truly unemployed would also qualify as an unreasonable search to such a judge. Income verification for access to food stamps? Why, that's an unreasonable intrusion into the privacy of their financial condition don't you know. You gotta love this stuff. I guess Florida will have to do away with any and all qualifications to receive public charity in order to avoid unreasonably searching the applicants who are seeking to dip their hands into the public coffers.

I guess the real question is how to Florida employers feel about it, they are the one's paying for it....the one's that make the decision to hire less when Unemployment Insurance costs go up too much. Not a comment of drug users, just that businesses have the incentive to keep anyone they can off unemployment because it is very expensive. Perhaps they even lobbied for this, as it would cut costs and increase profits. Labor is one of the only large variable costs in many businesses and Unemployment Insurance can get very high if you have ever had anyone claim against your previous employment of them...it can cost even more than SS.

We know Rick Scott will be upset... He owns a huge piece of the company doing the testing, and this will interfere with his kickback.