Nevada wasn’t the first state to approve recreational marijuana usage, but it is the first to make it illegal to discriminate against users.
That’s not the language used in the bill, but that’s what the law does. Instead of leaving it up to an employer to determine if they want a drug free workplace, you have to treat marijuana users as equals to non-users.
New York City has similar legislation which will go into effect shortly after Nevada’s, even though New York doesn’t have legalized recreational marijuana.
There is logic to this change because unlike alcohol, which clears out of your system relatively rapidly; you can test positive for marijuana when you aren’t remotely high.
To keep reading, click here: Nevada Is the First U.S. State to Make It Illegal to Refuse Employment for Marijuana Usage–and It Won’t Be the Last. How to Adjust Your Drug Screening Policies.
Interesting. Currently employers can and do refuse employment if there is a positive test for nicotine. In fact they can fire you if you even arrive to work smelling of tobacco. But for some ironic reason it is now OK to be positive for cannabis!?
Well, while I think that inhaling plant smoke is harmful regardless of the species you’re burning, tobacco use is clearly linked to various conditions which insurance companies use to justify charging employers more for benefits.
Marijuana users can relax about usage—that particular note in the article was amusing but article does address serious issues. Primarily because being under the influence of any substance can effect performance at work. Granted some use, medicinally, has value but what is referred to in the article is the use of recreational marijuana with THC that effects the control of the conscious mind to react to situations. Use of recreational marijuana in relation to a job should be demanded in the same constricts of alcohol use.—If it causes impairment to performance, then the employment can be limited.
We all ready have people who drive impaired despite the consequences. Recreational marijuana use does impair performance the same way. There’s no difference.
What is needed is proper testing for the level of presence of the level of THC in the body.
It’s probably going to be a long time before there is a scientific consensus regarding the degree of impairment attributable to various levels of THC. Right now, there’s a large body of scientific evidence regarding the effect of various blood alcohol levels on reaction rates, etc. There is little, if any, comparable evidence regarding THC.
I 100% agree that one should not come to work high, drunk, or any combination of the two.
However, for marijuana, there are no commercially available tests that can measure contemporaneous impairment versus that time you got baked at a Phish concert a month and a half ago.
This law will have both good and bad effects, but I support it because there is not even a known correlation between blood or urine levels of THC or byproducts and level of impairment.
I would hope that employers are still allowed to test directly for impairment (for instance by coordination tests) and use the result in disciplinary decisions.
The same logic applies, and the same practices ought to apply, to impaired driving laws as well, including those that target alcohol. Most people can handle driving after one or two drinks and should not be punished just because a few cannot.