Welfare recipients to be drug tested

Apparently you can buy drugs with those food stamp cards:

 

I didn't say it was impossible. I said it was harder to do. Much harder than faking a drug test.

What are those drug dealers going to do with 60 EBP cards? Groceries for life?

Why do we not ID the EBT card holder when a purchase is made?

That is MUCH more effective than drug tests. I don't know a person that does drugs and hasn't faked a drug test.

 

The dealers, just like the regular cardholders, will go to a store that will either ring up a fake sale and either give them cash or alcohol at around 30-50 cents per dollar.

 

Your money would be better spent trying to regulate places that take EBT. Impose fines for such actions.

Seriously, I have faked a drug test while someone was watching me pee.

 

I am not sure I understand your alleged position as a strict Constitutionalist; promoting and providing for the general welfare are specifically enumerated terms in our federal Constitution. Eliminating poverty in our republic meets some criteria that is relevant to those terms.

What is your position regarding our non-enumerated wars on abstractions?

 

*shrug* Preventing the poisoning of American's seems to fall under the same clause -- general welfare and all.

 

So you want to pick and choose who to take care of instead of indiscriminately taking care of all Americans?

 

Not at all, but I am comfortable requiring folks who apply for charity to help themselves if they want to receive that charity. I'm also comfortable with the judgement that folks who consume illegal and expensive narcotics to escape reality into a chemically induced dissociative state are not putting sufficient attention to becoming self sufficient. I believe simply handing them money will only enable their destructive and illegal behavior and therefore make matters worse for them and for society. I believe handing them money is not taking care of them.

 

I can certainly dig that.

Although, I consume illegal and expensive narcotics to escape reality into a chemically induced dissociative state I agree with you.

The difference is, I am self sufficient.

But I must ask you; how do you think drug testing will solve prevent these people from doing drugs

This is mostly true. There are people who could genuinely benefit by just handing them money, but that is by far the minority. That is why I'd be in favor of issuing them a currency other than money and then regulate the hell out of it. That seems to be a much more cost effective option to get the job done, if the objective is to help people.

 

I consider that a significant difference. While I don't condone the practice of recreational narcotic consumption and I recognize it is illegal, personally I don't care what you do with your body, in your bedroom, or with your life other than how it affects me.

If you are self sufficient, if you don't require charity from me now (and are not likely to as a result of your habits) and are not otherwise impacting my life, I wish you luck with the life you have chosen. I am less willing to grant those well wishes to folks who demand charity from me to support their life but can't stop escaping reality in an expensive drug induced dissociative state long enough to attain the self sufficiency you claim.

We cannot prevent folks from abusing children or committing murder. It seems unlikely we will be able to prevent people from using narcotics. But we take steps to protect ourselves and society by passing laws and implementing policies that discourage murder, that make it more difficult to accomplish, and that penalize those who insist on the practice. I am comfortable with doing the same for folks who would encumber me with supporting their lives while they check out of reality through abuse of narcotics.

 

Actually, it will save them money. I would be willing to bet that even in this bad economy, at least 35% of current welfare recipients are on some form of illegal narcotic. It's not that there aren't job out there, even now, but that a lot of people can't pass the drug screening. If drugs weren't an issue, no one would bother drug testing -- but you can't get a job at a gas station without peeing in a cup because a sizeable minority of all Americans are on drugs. And it's probably worse on welfare, because those are the people who either cannot find a job or have stopped looking. Considering the drug testing by companies, i bet a lot of welfare recipients are on welfare because they can't stay clean long enough to pass a drug test.

I don't think it's fair to the rest of us to pay for someone who would rather get high than work.

 

Everyone seems to be missing the part where the drug tests are going to be a huge expenditure and prevent nothing.

 

Post 487 is logical. If one makes the assumption that welfare is necessary, a corollary is that the welfare recipient is a paid employee (i.e. paid to watch Oprah Winfrey and vote for Obama) and subject to drug testing. The problem, is that monitoring a deadbeat is a double-expenditure. Stop the nonsense welfare payments and one doesn't have to worry about drug-testing expenditures.

 

Give us a specific loophole and explain how yatchs are sailed through it.

 

If they get about 5% of recipients kicked off, that will pay for the tests for everyone else.

So the question is, will enough people get caught and booted to offset the costs of the tests for everyone else?

 

Good point , but the problem with drug testing is that it doesnt prove who would rather get high than work but just who gets high. Drug testing is worthless.

 

Never. Drug tests are ineffective. I would be seriously surprised if .01% got booted because of a drug test.

Most drugs stay in your system 1 to 2 days, including inhalents, opiates, cocain, heroin, Amphetamines, Codine, Oxycodone...

These drug tests will find marijuana users and not much more. Guess who your problem is? Not the ones using the non-addictive one.

Drug tests are worthless in all instances.

 

Perhaps. I've seen meth-heads who can't stay clean long enough to sit through one session at court, so I'm betting enough people will be unwilling to stay clean for these tests. I expect this program to at least break even.

But time will tell. The government will be keeping track of expenses, number of people cut, etc, so we'll be able to tell very quickly if this saves money.

 

It helps to ensure the person of ready to take an employment offer which is the goal of welfare, to sustain the person while they seek to take responsibility for themselves. We who provide that sustenance have every right to require they prove they are.

 

Use hair testing.

 

And this is a good point. If a person can't clean up long enough to pass a drug test for welfare, they can't clean up long enough to pass a drug test for a job.

 

Hair testing is your answer?

Did you know that costs about 3 times as much as a urine test?

Those tests take a long time as well. The time and money consumed would exceed the benefit gained by far.

 

No, it does no such thing.

Your country has 12 percent unemployment because there arent enough jobs to go round not because 12 percent of the population are unwilling to work. Drug testing wont create jobs, all it will do is penalise those at the bottom of the ladder and further ensure they stay mired in poverty.

 

Despite being prohibitively expensive hair testing like other methods cannot detect use of all illegal drugs.

 

Our unemployment rate hasn't reached 12% in the last 60 years.

Unemployment peaked in the 80's under the Reagan administration at close to 11%.

We are currently at 9.2%