I have never had a background check until after I was hired at my current job. After I had been hired for a long time, suddenly they did background checks on everyone, though surely by then they knew everyone well enough to know that none of us were likely to run amuk and start shooting coworkers.
Suddenly background checks are in. I do not know why. Guess I should ask.
I think they are afraid of being sued if anyone anywhere in the USA claims to have been hurt or inconvenienced or discriminated against due to one of the company's products. "How can you say you are safe? You employ KNOWN DRUG ABUSERS!" At a previous employer of mine - a very large US company - checks for drugs & so on came in about 5 years ago. Also, to intense bad publicity, tests for HIV and other diseases (because of health insurance, supposedly). They didn't apply to existing employees except in safety related jobs. Very much the flavour of the month, because of news articles blaming drunk or drugged train drivers, machine operators & so on for causing accidents. As our company has lost or killed maybe couple of hundred people in industrial accidents in the previous decade or so we were sensitive to it. Though why they wanted to extend it to workers who didn't drive anything more lethal than a desk was beyond me. Here in the UK (things may be different in the US) it is probably easier for someone with a criminal record to get a job with government or public bodies, or with charities and non-profit organisations, than it would be with a private company. Though of course it depends on the nature of the record. I doubt if a 30 yearold record for hemp is going to lose anyone any job at the moment in Britain. It might even be a qualification fro getting elected to Parliament. For about 6 months now prominent politicians have been queuing up to "confess" to having smoked dope in their mis-spent youths. Ken Brown